Never waste time at Wal-Mart again

By Parija Kavilanz, senior writer


NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Love Wal-Mart but hate running across its football-field-sized stores for a tube of toothpaste? Now you don't have to.

Wal-Mart (WMT, Fortune 500), the world's largest retailer, is debuting a new free service later this month that lets customers order items online at walmart.com and then pick them up four hours later at the nearest store.

However, online orders that are placed after 6 p.m. will be ready for pick up at 10 a.m. the next day, the company said.

The service, called "Pick Up Today," rolls out this month and will be available in 3,600 Wal-Mart stores nationwide by June.

The service includes about 40,000 items that include baby products, toys, furniture, electronics and appliances.

"Pick up Today allows customers to see the inventory of their local Wal-mart store," said Walmart.com spokesman Ravi Jariwala.

However, the service excludes online-only items.

"Online-only items aren't eligible but can still be shipped for free to a store via our Site to Store program," said Jariwala. The Site to Store service ships products to stores in four to seven days.

This latest customer offering from Wal-Mart comes as the discounter struggles to inject some excitement among its shoppers as its sales sag.

Wal-Mart executives have admitted that the retailer has not been doing a good job in catering to the needs of its core shoppers. Therefore, Wal-Mart shoppers are going elsewhere.

In its latest woes, two recent price comparisons of grocery and household goods revealed that rival Target is beating out Wal-Mart's in some key and household products such as milk, eggs and beauty items. To top of page

Just the hot list include
Frontline troops push for solar energy
The U.S. Marines are testing renewable energy technologies like solar to reduce costs and casualties associated with fossil fuels. Play
25 Best Places to find rich singles
Looking for Mr. or Ms. Moneybags? Hunt down the perfect mate in these wealthy cities, which are brimming with unattached professionals. More
Fun festivals: Twins to mustard to pirates!
You'll see double in Twinsburg, Ohio, and Ketchup lovers should beware in Middleton, WI. Here's some of the best and strangest town festivals. Play
Index Last Change % Change
Dow 32,627.97 -234.33 -0.71%
Nasdaq 13,215.24 99.07 0.76%
S&P 500 3,913.10 -2.36 -0.06%
Treasuries 1.73 0.00 0.12%
Data as of 6:29am ET
Company Price Change % Change
Ford Motor Co 8.29 0.05 0.61%
Advanced Micro Devic... 54.59 0.70 1.30%
Cisco Systems Inc 47.49 -2.44 -4.89%
General Electric Co 13.00 -0.16 -1.22%
Kraft Heinz Co 27.84 -2.20 -7.32%
Data as of 2:44pm ET
Sponsors

Sections

Bankrupt toy retailer tells bankruptcy court it is looking at possibly reviving the Toys 'R' Us and Babies 'R' Us brands. More

Land O'Lakes CEO Beth Ford charts her career path, from her first job to becoming the first openly gay CEO at a Fortune 500 company in an interview with CNN's Boss Files. More

Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.