BENTONVILLE, Ark. — Wal-Mart’s $4 generic prescription program has saved shoppers at least $1 billion, according to Sandy Kinsey, Wal-Mart’s pharmacy divisional merchandise manager. Along with savings shoppers’ money, Wal-Mart has also benefited from the initiative in the form of share increases in the $4 prescriptions, Kinsey said at IRI’s Reinventing CPG & Retail Summit, held earlier this month in Kissimmee, Fla. Wal-Mart pioneered the $4 generic prescription concept in 2006. Kroger, Target, Giant Eagle and other retailers have since followed suit. The $4 prescriptions are especially beneficial to the 16% of Wal-Mart shoppers classified as “Price Value” shoppers, meaning they have the lowest incomes, are in the poorest health, one of five is uninsured, and one in four has skipped medical treatment due to cost concerns; the 29% who are “Brand Aspirationals,” those with the second-lowest income, and one of four suffers from hypertensions despite relative youth; and 11% who are “Price Sensitive Affluents,” mostly Boomers, and one of four has skipped medical treatment due to cost concerns. The Price Value and Brand Aspirationals comprise about half of the 47 million Americans without health insurance, according to Kinsey. “We know with our consumers that health care is top of mind,” she said. “So, Wal-Mart is getting involved.”

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