The Friday Checkout is a weekly column providing more insight on the news, rounding up the announcements you may have missed and sharing what’s to come.
To the unaided eye, Walmart’s plan to update the look of its Great Value food and consumables brand might look like just another move by a merchant to tweak the aesthetics of items it sells. But Great Value isn’t just any product line: The brand is Walmart's largest private label — and it has helped define store-branded products in the minds of consumers for more than 30 years.
In the early 1990s, when Walmart introduced Great Value, shoppers still viewed what were then still cast as “generics” primarily as cheap goods. Today, of course, retailers routinely promote quality as a top virtue of their own brands — and look to them as a way to beef up their notoriously thin margins. That’s why Walmart’s recent announcement that it’s spiffing up what it describes as “the largest food and consumables consumer packaged goods” brand in the U.S. for the first time in more than a decade is so significant.
The comments Walmart Vice President of Creative David Hartman made to CNBC are particularly memorable. Shoppers, he said, were impressed with the quality and price of Great Value products but “didn’t particularly feel very proud to display [them] in their home or with their families.”
That’s a clear indicator that aesthetics matter and a message other retailers — especially those that are overdue for a private label makeover — can’t afford to miss.
In case you missed it
Regional grocers grow their store fleets
Last Saturday, Publix opened a store in Durham, North Carolina, adding to its more than 60 locations in the state. Meanwhile, The Giant Company on Tuesday announced plans for an approximately 39,000-square-foot store in Ephrata, Pennsylvania, that will mark its second store in the Lancaster County borough. The Ahold Delhaize-owned banner said it will share the opening date at a later time. Currently, The Giant Company runs 12 stores in Lancaster County.
Winn-Dixie expands Amazon tie-up in ultra-competitive Florida market
With its newly expanded partnership, the e-commerce giant is now providing delivery for the grocer across Florida’s largest metropolitan areas, according to a Tuesday announcement. This allows Winn-Dixie to reach “the majority of Florida households,” the grocer said. Amazon and Winn-Dixie first linked up in September 2025 and started offering delivery in the state’s Jacksonville and Orlando metropolitan areas several months ago.
The expansion comes at a time when Winn-Dixie is dialing up its efforts to stand out in the competitive grocery market in Florida, including its new visual identity and plans to remodel as well as open stores.
NYC shares more details on city-owned grocery stores
New York City Mayor Zoran Mamdani announced Tuesday that the city plans to open its first of five grocery stores in late 2027 and that a store on a site it’s identified in East Harlem is expected to open in 2029. The city will own the land and cover overhead costs such as rent and construction for the five stores. A private operator, which the city will select through a request for proposals, will handle daily operations and “be contractually required to pass savings directly to customers on a core basket of everyday staples,” according to an announcement from the city.
Impulse find
Publix turns to Texas for deli influence
Publix is in its brisket era. The grocery chain announced Thursday that it has added three new brisket subs and one new brisket sandwich toits deli selection.
While Publix’s Chicken Tender Pub sub continues to be a star among its deli offerings, the grocer said it added the new brisket options “to create something worthy of that same devoted following.”
The additions came to life after the grocer identified a Texas-based supplier with a well-known smokehouse that could provide “the quality and consistency we were looking for.”
