Walmart now wants to be the plumber for your local convenience store

While the company just unveiled the new business publicly, it has been quietly working for about a year with external clients at about 500 locations — including quick-service restaurants and smaller retailers — RJ Zanes, vp of facility services for Walmart, told Modern Retail. He expects HVAC and refrigeration services to be the most in-demand initially, followed by food equipment, electrical and plumbing.

“We have to maintain the world’s largest real estate platform for the world’s largest retailer, and now that we’ve shown that we can do that very well, we want to begin to offer that to others,” Zanes said.

Upstream’s name comes from an old Sam Walton saying about “swimming upstream,” or doing things in a different way than others and ignoring the conventional wisdom.

“Our program and the transformation we’ve made within real estate and maintenance, in general — where we’ve moved from a reactive model to a proactive predictive model, embedding AI in computer vision and digital twins — are really transforming the industry,” Zanes said. Walmart’s digital twins, or 3D models, mirror everything from floor plans, parking lots and shelving to infrastructure including refrigeration, HVAC, and electrical and plumbing systems. “We wanted to have a name that went back to our core roots and who we are.”

Walmart used to rely on outside electricians, plumbers and HVAC contractors, but saw increases in cost and no improvements in performance, according to Zanes. That was until about seven years ago, when the company began hiring for trade-based skills within its workforce, such as food equipment, HVAC and refrigeration technicians. As a result, per Zanes, the company now saves about $1.2 billion annually in maintenance costs.

The retailer now has almost 10,000 maintenance employees that support its infrastructure, within 10 minutes of 90% of the U.S. population, Zanes said.

“We’ve got our systems operating soundly and reliably, and we want to help lower the costs in the industry, in this space,” Zanes said, adding that the new venture will create new positions for employees to advance into. “We also want to continue to develop talent and give talent the opportunity to grow.”

The company will hire more employees based on demand, ensuring that its own stores remain well serviced when adding on external clients, Zanes said.

“No longer, for us, are the days of having to wait for my boss to be promoted so I can grow into that position,” Zanes said. “Now I’m creating more of those positions so they can grow right into them, versus waiting on someone to move.”

The scale advantage

Zanes said he expects to serve quick-service restaurants, convenience stores and light retail, non-direct competitors. Eventually, that could mean the company will have more employees who would individually stay in close proximity to a Walmart store, serving nearby businesses instead of driving across town to another Walmart.

“That gives better efficiencies with less windshield time — or less drive time — and gives our clients, as well as Walmart, a better mean time to resolution when there is a problem,” Zanes said.

Zanes added that 90% of the population lives within 10 minutes of a Walmart store, meaning that the company’s technicians are likely also in close proximity to many potential commercial clients.

“One of the biggest costs in the industry is a trip charge. Those trip charges range anywhere from about $110 to $150 per trip. That doesn’t count the labor that they’re now going to charge you on top of that,” Zanes said. “Because I’m within 10 minutes, my trip charge is a quarter of that cost, so that’s going to be disruptive from a cost perspective for the industry.”

That also works in reverse: a Walmart store’s maintenance workers may be closer to the Walmart store when issues arrive. “When I have a technician that’s sitting in the parking lot maintaining a Walmart and then a QSR at the edge of the parking lot, Walmart actually gets a better service, as well as that customer getting a better service, faster service at a lower cost,” Zanes said.

Walmart, like in other facets of its business, also has a scale advantage. It is already buying parts across 5,000-plus Walmart and Sam’s Club stores. Zanes said that many of the same parts it buys for its stores it can buy for its commercial clients, letting them benefit from Walmart’s negotiating power.

Walmart’s next big biz?

The facilities business is yet another example of Walmart and other retailers adding new businesses like advertising and data services to increase their historically low margins — or, in Amazon’s case, its massive digital infrastructure business in Amazon Web Services.

Retailers have “spent all this money to actually facilitate these [services] — either online, e-commerce, delivery, etc.. Now, they’re using that tech to help other retailers as their own customers,” said Mickey Chadha, a retail analyst and vp of corporate finance for Moody’s. “If you’re using it yourself, it’s a cost center. … Now, they want to make it into a profit center.”

Oliver Bogner, managing partner of The Advisory Investment Bank — an investment bank focused on essential services such as HVAC, plumbing, electrical and pest control — said he imagines Walmart winning contracts with major fast-food chains such as Chick-fil-A and McDonald’s on hood inspections.

“None of those guys are doing their facilities maintenance in-house; they’re outsourcing it,” Bogner said. “Why not outsource it to Walmart, who will probably come in at the lowest price — but not only at a solid price, they’ll have, what’s more important to these QSRs, responsiveness in getting a tech out there.”

Bogner said he also wonders whether Walmart will make a large acquisition in the sector to grow the business. Simultaneously, he also questions whether the company will stay in the business for the long run, as the company just a couple of years ago shut down its health business of care centers and telehealth operations.

“Walmart’s super smart of saying, ‘We’re going to plant the flag,'” he said, adding that the market for facilities services is quite large. Total facilities management spending is projected to surpass $3 trillion by 2026, according to commercial real estate company JLL. “If they have a bumpy start, as they did in health care, are they going to abandon ship? But if they don’t abandon ship, it’s a tremendous business for them.”