Always a Low Price. Not Always a Credit Card.

I heard something interesting about Wal-Mart. Over 100 million people shop at Wal-Mart Stores each week. Not a big surprise given how many stores they have. Amazingly, though, only 50% of these customers have credit cards. Given that the US population is 300 million and 190 million people carry credit cards, I am having trouble with the math. If true, this implies that virtually everyone in the country who doesn't have a credit card shops at Wal-Mart and those with credit cards are more likely to shop elsewhere in any given week. With that many customers each week, one would think Wal-Mart's customers would look more like the general population.

Comments

[D-Mac]

Hey Rob. Sam's club only takes debit cards. WalMart had that anti-trust suit against MC/Visa a while back. Pretty viscious, which is why Sam's only take debit. Cuts out the merchant Fee. That probably explains part of the quirk. Also, the average American has 4 credit cards. So the statistics are probably off. It may only be 50 million people that actually have cards, it is just multiple cards.