There is no single button on walmart.com that turns you into a Walmart supplier. People search for "how to become a Walmart supplier" expecting an application form, and what they find is a set of doors, each with its own rules. Knowing which door fits your product is most of the work.
Walmart bought from more than 100,000 suppliers last year, and reported that over 60% of its U.S. suppliers were small businesses in FY2025, verified against SBA size standards. So the opportunity is real, and it is not reserved for billion-dollar brands. But Walmart's merchants are buying for thousands of stores at once. The bar is product fit and the ability to deliver at scale, and the entry points are built to filter for both.
Here is how the path actually works.
First, decide what "supplier" means for youTwo different things get called "selling to Walmart," and they are not the same business.
Walmart Marketplace is the third-party seller program on Walmart.com. You list your product, you own the inventory, you ship to the customer (or use Walmart Fulfillment Services), and Walmart takes a referral fee on each sale. You are not a Walmart supplier in the wholesale sense. You are an online seller using Walmart's site as a channel. For a small consumer brand testing demand, this is the fastest way in, and the application is self-serve.
Being a Walmart supplier means Walmart buys your product wholesale and resells it, on shelves or on Walmart.com, under its own purchase orders. This is where the merchant meetings, the Supplier Agreement, Retail Link, and EDI come in. It is a bigger commitment on both sides, and it does not start with a form. It starts with a merchant deciding they want your product.
Most people searching this term want the second one. The rest of this guide is about that path.
The discovery path: RangeMe and Open CallWalmart's merchants find new products mainly through two channels.
RangeMe is the year-round product discovery platform Walmart uses for sourcing. You build a profile, list your product with pricing, certifications, and where it's made, and Walmart buyers can find you when they're sourcing in your category. It is not a guarantee of a meeting. It is how you get visible to the people doing the buying. Treat the profile like a sales pitch: complete every field, and be specific about capacity and compliance, because that is what a merchant screens for.
Open Call is Walmart's annual event for products made, grown, or assembled in the United States. Suppliers apply (Walmart has run applications through RangeMe), and selected applicants get a 30-minute, one-on-one meeting with a Walmart or Sam's Club merchant. Open Call 2025 ran October 7 to 8, with applications due July 25. The dates shift each year, so check the current cycle. The outcomes range widely: a yes might mean a handful of local stores, or it might mean hundreds of stores plus Walmart.com, Sam's Club, and the Marketplace. A "deal" at Open Call is often a starting order, not a national rollout.
If your product isn't U.S.-made, Open Call isn't your lane, but RangeMe still is.
What merchants actually look forThree things, in roughly this order.
Product fit. Does this solve a gap on the shelf, at a price and margin that works for the category? A merchant is not buying your story. They are buying a unit that sells and doesn't sit. Know your category, your competitors, and your price point cold.
Capacity. Can you produce and deliver at the volume a Walmart order implies, without your supply chain breaking? This is where small suppliers stumble. Winning a 500-store order you can't fill is worse than not winning it. Be honest about what you can ship, and pitch for the volume you can actually serve. Walmart's own guidance to Open Call applicants stresses starting at the level you can support, from a few local stores up.
Compliance readiness. Walmart requires a federal Tax ID, a GS1 company prefix for barcodes, and product audits and inspections that vary by category (food safety rules are stricter than general merchandise). Approved product suppliers also have to carry Supplier Liability Insurance, typically within 30 days of accepting the Supplier Agreement. None of this is exotic, but a merchant wants to see you can clear it.
Where supplier diversity fitsWalmart runs a Supplier Inclusion effort, and it is a real edge if you qualify, not a side door that skips the product bar.
Walmart accepts third-party diversity certifications: minority-owned (MBE), women-owned (WBE), disability-owned (DOBE), LGBTQ+-owned (LGBTBE), and veteran-owned, where the business is at least 51% owned, operated, and controlled by someone from a diverse background. The certification has to come from a recognized body. For MBE that's typically an NMSDC affiliate. For WBE it's usually WBENC or a government program.
Certification does a few concrete things in Walmart's pipeline. It makes you findable as a diverse supplier when Walmart's category teams are specifically sourcing to inclusion goals. It signals that your ownership claim has been vetted by a third party, so a merchant isn't taking your word for it. And it plugs you into Walmart's supplier development resources: the Walmart Supplier Academy e-learning modules, mentorship pathways for selected businesses, and early-payment financing through partners like C2FO. Walmart has also supported certification cost reimbursement for qualifying diverse suppliers through partner certifying organizations, so getting certified may cost less than the sticker price.
What certification does not do is replace product fit. A diverse supplier with a weak product still gets a no. Think of it as the thing that gets your strong product seen and trusted faster.
If you're weighing MBE certification, our complete NMSDC MBE certification guide walks through eligibility, cost, and the application. And Walmart is one of hundreds of corporate programs you can target. Our corporate programs directory shows which companies actively buy from certified diverse suppliers and how to reach their supplier diversity teams, so you're not betting everything on one retailer.
After a merchant says yesA yes is the start of onboarding, not the finish line. Once a merchant approves your product:
- You receive a Supplier Agreement through Retail Link, Walmart's supplier portal. It sets your compliance obligations, chargeback rules, and EDI requirements. Read it closely; the chargebacks are real money.
- You set up insurance. Supplier Liability Insurance is generally required within 30 days of accepting the agreement.
- You connect EDI. Walmart runs on EDI for purchase orders, invoices, and shipment notices, using the AS2 protocol, and you test in their certification environment before you can transact live. Marketplace-only sellers can use WebEDI; multi-channel suppliers usually need full EDI.
- You live in Retail Link. It's where your sales data, item management, and compliance scorecards sit. Your scorecard performance affects whether the order grows or quietly disappears.
Most suppliers do not go from cold to national in one cycle. The pattern that works: get certified if you qualify, build a complete RangeMe profile, apply to Open Call if your product is U.S.-made, and pitch for a starter footprint you can actually fill. Land a few stores or a regional test, hit your scorecard numbers, then grow from proof.
The suppliers who flame out are the ones who win big and can't deliver. The ones who build a durable Walmart business start smaller than the win they imagined, and earn the bigger order.
If you're building toward this, make sure your business reads as a serious vendor before you pitch. Set up a supplier profile so buyers can find you, and if you still need certification, CertifyAll handles the filing so your MBE, WBE, or veteran credential is in place when a Walmart merchant asks for it.
