Walmart to Absorb Jet Team; Belhsam Departing in Overhaul

Jet.com helped Walmart get its e-commerce business in high gear, but the favor doesn’t appear to have been returned.

The Bentonville, Ark.-based mass merchant said it would be integrating Jet’s teams into Walmart in the coming months, including what currently are separate retail, marketing, technology, analytics and product teams. Jet President Simon Belsham, who arrived a little more than a year ago, will also depart the retailer when the transition is complete in August.

Walmart acquired Jet in 2016 for $3.3 billion and installed its founder, Marc Lore, as its global e-commerce CEO and adopted its proprietary “smart cart” technology as a means to adapt everyday low-price positioning for e-commerce. The latter has been a roaring success, particularly in bringing online grocery to thousands of Walmart stores. Jet, which at one time had ambitions to be a nationally focused e-commerce brand, was instead used by Walmart as its brand to reach urban shoppers, particularly in New York, where the parent brand was less resonant.

Belsham led the repositioning, which focused on a combination of groceries and specialty brands, but sales have declined, Lore said in a blog post.

“While this [repositioning] has made Jet smaller from a sales perspective, it has helped us create a smart portfolio approach where our businesses complement each other,” Lore said.

A Reuters report indicated Jet has missed its targeted revenue goals and seen a decline in the number of its shoppers. Walmart, in the meantime, has encouraged suppliers to spend with Walmart.com over Jet.

“Bringing together talent from Jet and Walmart into joint teams has created more opportunity for our business and our people,” Lore said.

Kieran Shanahan, who currently oversees the food, consumables and health and wellness categories for Walmart.com, will also oversee the strategy and management of Jet going forward.

Shanahan is a veteran of Walmart’s Asda division who helped to build Walmart’s earliest online grocery efforts in the U.S. “His experience and the relationships he brings from multiple areas of the business will be critical for the further integrated role Jet will play within our portfolio,” Lore said. “This natural progression of integrating an acquisition, allows us to fully leverage Walmart’s assets for Jet and leverage Jet’s talent for Walmart.”

Lore said Jet “continues to be a very valuable brand to us, and it is playing a specific role in helping Walmart reach urban customers.” He added the company was looking to other cities “where we might bring together Jet’s expertise and the scale and operating model of Walmart.”