AI
The potential impact of Walmart's ChatGPT shopping strategy
The world's largest retailer is expanding its AI use via ChatGPT. But there are questions on how the shopping channel will be received by consumers.
February 3, 2026 by Judy Mottl — Editor, RetailCustomerExperience.com & DigitalSignageToday.com
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ClaudeWalmart is teaming with OpenAI to allow its wholesale club members shop directly within ChatGPT and check out using the chatbot's instant checkout option.
"For many years now, e-commerce shopping experiences have consisted of a search bar and a long list of item responses. That is about to change. There is a native AI experience coming that is multi-media, personalized and contextual. We are running towards that more enjoyable and convenient future with Sparky and through partnerships including this important step with OpenAI," Doug McMillon, president and CEO, Walmart Inc., said in a press release on the initiative.
The partnership been cited as a landmark deal yet there are more than a few questions about how shopping via ChatGPT will be received by consumers and how it could revamp the retail landscape in terms of customer experience.
Walmart previously debuted a Gen AI tool, called Sparky, which aids shoppers using its app with product suggestions and product information. OpenAI has also announced similar partnerships with Shopify and Etsy. Amazon offers Rufus, a Gen AI shopping helper that provides similar shopping assistance. Target in late 2025 launched a conversational, curated shopping experience in ChatGPT. The beta effort is part of the retailer's effort to reimagine AI-powered shopping,
The world's largest retailer is expanding its use of artificial intelligence as companies across sectors adopt the technology to simplify tasks and cut costs.
RetailCustomerExperience reached out via email for insight from Mariia Petryk, an assistant professor in information systems and operations management at George Mason University's Costello College of Business.
Petryk has conducted research on virtual apparel and how clothing brands have leveraged it to streamline demand conversion and broader shift toward digital-first shopping experiences. Her research focuses on emerging technology management, digital and mobile platforms, blockchain and social networks. Her work has been published in leading academic outlets and spoken at major conferences.
Q: Is the OpenAI/Walmart deal to offer shopping/purchase in ChatGPT being driven by consumer demand and expectation?
Petryk: Primarily, business deals with AI-solutions providers are driven by the investor expectations. It is the reaction to the overall wave of investment in AI technology and the expectation of quick and excessive ROI. Consumer demand is a secondary driver for the implementation of AI solutions. Is AI helpful for consumer relations management? Yes. Can a retailer scale its operations more efficiently with AI? Yes. Is the AI solution business paradigm-changing in relation to consumers? Probably not. The business logic of business-to-consumer communication remains the same — address consumer needs — and generate a larger volume of sales and consumer loyalty. So, now consumer-facing AI adoption by businesses is also about locking in the loyal consumers with better customer service.
Q: Are there any unique challenges for retailers when it comes to the ChatGPT shopping journey?
Petryk: Oh, yes. Plenty. First of all, AI chatbots in their current state have quite primitive interfaces. It is mostly a plain contextual window with not much visuals. Moreover, in their current form, they are "pull" systems in that the consumer has to initiate a conversation thread for the chat to provide advertising output or a custom-tailored useful recommendation. One of the biggest attention grabbers of the current social media platforms (which are major advertising platforms) or even websites is that they have an endless thread with a lot of visuals. The process of eternal scrolling locks in the customer's attention, and if the customer scrolls long enough, they will encounter something they didn't know they needed (as my husband likes to joke).
The second difficulty is related to the design of the smooth AI agents for shopping. We are at the beginning of the agentic internet era, but a lot of challenges lie ahead. For example, the agent needs to know when to end the conversation and quit the endless loop of "thanking" the consumer for their interaction.
Furthermore, the advanced features like voice-to-voice interactions are in a very pre-mature stage technologically, and it will take some time to engineer working AI workflows for those.
Q: Is digital-first shopping primed to take retail by storm in 2026, or will it be a more measured adoption?
Petryk: The pace of technology development is exponential, so it is hard to tell whether it will be 2026, 2027, or 2028, etc.. However, there will be a lag in business adoption only because the AI agents require business process re-engineering. It takes time, especially in large hierarchical companies. Therefore, the pace of adoption is constrained by the rigidity of current organizational structures rather than technology itself.
Q: What does the deal signify about retail industry trends?
Petryk: The adoption of AI by the retail industry is quite a predictable thing. For that matter, any technology that helps resolve the core retail issues: predict demand, reduce returns through better recommendations, increase throughput of the customer service and issue resolution channels, and do it at a lower cost. Therefore, the partnerships with AI infrastructure and solutions providers are to be expected. Interestingly, what this partnership speaks to more is that the AI industry has reached a ripe moment to begin accruing returns on its investments and delivering the promised gains to its investors.
About Judy Mottl
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