This transcript was prepared by a transcription service. This version may not be in its final form and may be updated.Speaker 2: Times are tough and prices are rising.Speaker 2: Fruit, especially fruit,Speaker 4: I've cut way back on a lot of stuff that were not really needs but wants.
Sarah Nassauer: Their core customer is lower and middle income, but most people shop at Walmart at least sometimes, in some situations. And so because of that and just their massive scale, you can get a good sense of what's going on with American shoppers if you look at Walmart. Sarah Nassauer: Earlier this year in the spring, Walmart changed all of its summer marketing messages to a value message. They had a marketing plan to do things like promote new clothing lines and sort of stylish things that they were selling and they scrapped those ads and went with a value message. "Come here to save money."
Sarah Nassauer: It wasn't a cheery tone on the consumer for next year. They were clearly said over and over again, "We're being cautious. We're being cautious with how we buy some of the categories that people are buying less of. We're being cautious on how we plan for people's ability to keep spending."
Sarah Nassauer: It's a mixed bag. I think these things are so different depending on income level, obviously, and being a little bit cautious about next year. And for low income folks, the last nine months have been really, really brutal. Their ability to pay for what they need every week and every day has been challenged. So I hear a lot of overall sort of cautiousness.
Sarah Nassauer: So last month in October, Walmart and Sam's Club, which is their warehouse chain, hosted a meeting for suppliers. So at this meeting, Doug McMillon, who's the CEO of Walmart Inc. spoke to Sam's Club suppliers and one of his big messages this year was, "We are going to expect lower prices." And it struck some of the audience as the tone had changed. Over the last few years it's not been a time of discounting.
Sarah Nassauer: So Newell is a company that happens to be at the receiving end of Walmart really slowing down orders on discretionary items. Things that Walmart wanted a ton of last year when we were all buying them, they don't want anymore. We're not buying coffee machines at the same pace.
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