Walmart CEO Pledges No Personalized Pricing as Digital Labels Spread

Walmart has promised it does not use personal data to set prices, and never will, as the retailer pushes digital shelf labels toward a chain-wide rollout.

CEO John Furner made the pledge in a statement posted on the company's website on Friday. He vowed that the Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer is not using personal information such as income, shopping history or a customer's willingness to pay to determine prices — and won't in the future.

"We don't set different prices based on who you are or the time of day, and we won't," Furner wrote. "Whether you're buying groceries or electronics on a hot afternoon or in a sudden rush for an item, it's never a reason to charge you more."

The commitment covers more than the shelf. Furner said Walmart is holding its artificial intelligence shopping assistant, Sparky, to the same standard: the bot will not be used to raise a customer's price or hide lower-priced options that meet their needs.

Such practices would violate the company's "every day low prices" business model, Furner said.

The CEO acknowledged that prices do move. Walmart lowers them when it can pass savings along, and sometimes raises them when an item costs more to buy or to transport, he said.

The statement arrives amid mounting scrutiny. Shoppers, consumer advocates and lawmakers have voiced skepticism about the rollout of digital price labels by Walmart and other retailers. The electronic tags are rapidly replacing paper shelf tags at U.S. supermarkets, letting stores change prices instantly from a central computer instead of sending workers to swap labels by hand.

The scale of the deployment is already substantial. Walmart said in March that 2,300 Walmart U.S. locations use digital shelves, and it expects the technology to reach the entire chain within the next year.

Company executives have repeatedly defended the system on operational grounds. They say electronic shelf tags help Walmart change prices consistently and ensure what's displayed matches what rings up at checkout. The tags also save workers time and cut labor costs by eliminating paper labels.

Regulators are watching. Last month, the Federal Trade Commission put companies on notice that personalized pricing could violate consumer protection laws. The agency said it lacks the legal authority to ban personalized pricing in all circumstances, but it issued a new bulletin warning companies they must disclose to customers how personal information is used to set a price.

Walmart's public commitment effectively preempts the scrutiny the FTC is now directing at the industry. With digital labels set to cover the chain within a year and Sparky fielding more customer interactions, the retailer's pricing practices will remain under a spotlight it has just invited.