Bettergoods Has Cleared Proof-of-Concept. Your Next Line Review Will Reflect It.

The Shopper Bettergoods Is Reaching Is the Same One You Are Chasing

Private label sales in the United States reached $330 billion last year, claiming a 24% unit share and a 23% dollar share of the total CPG market, according to two new reports released today by Circana. One is a global study spanning the EU, Australia, and the U.S. The other is a deep dive into American private label dynamics. Together they describe not a category in acceleration but one that is, as Circana’s global EVP Sally Lyons Wyatt put it, moving “from an acceleration phase into a normalized growth cycle.”

For suppliers, that framing matters more than the headline figure. Normalization means the structural drivers behind private label’s share gains — household financial pressure, improving quality perception, Gen Z adoption, and sustained retailer investment in brand equity — are now baseline conditions rather than temporary inflation responses. The category is not peaking. It is settling into a new floor while Walmart builds higher on top of it.

Walmart launched bettergoods in April 2024, describing it as its largest private brand food launch in two decades. The assortment started at 300 items and grew to more than 400 within the year, according to Fast Company, with top sellers concentrated in plant-based milks, snacks, nuts, and frozen wings. In just over a year on shelf, bettergoods had been purchased by 28% of U.S. households, according to Numerator’s updated tracking. Numerator also ranked it among the fastest-growing private label brands of both 2024 and 2025.

The shopper profile explains why those numbers matter to national brand suppliers specifically. Numerator’s early purchase analysis found the brand over-indexes with two distinct groups relative to Great Value buyers: low-income households were 34% more likely to purchase bettergoods, and high-income households were 20% more likely. The brand also skews meaningfully younger, with Gen Z buyers 67% more likely to choose it over Great Value. That data draws from Numerator’s early read on ice cream buyers, but the pattern it surfaces — a brand simultaneously trading up Walmart’s existing private label base and reaching shoppers who did not engage with Great Value — is precisely what Scott Morris, who was then Walmart’s senior vice president of private brands, food and consumables, described at launch: a brand designed to appeal to consumers across income spectrums. That is not a Great Value flanker. It is a separate competitive surface aimed at the same consumer most national food brands are trying to hold.

Former Walmart CEO Doug McMillon told CNBC that the company believes “branded manufacturers and all of our suppliers of all types will have to respond to that market in time.” Walmart did not wait for that response. Its April 2025 investor day confirmed that 21 U.S. private brands now each generate over $1 billion in annual sales, five of them over $5 billion, per John Furner, who was then CEO of Walmart U.S. and became President and CEO of Walmart Inc. on February 1, 2026. Bettergoods is not yet in that tier. In October 2025, Walmart extended its investment further by committing to remove synthetic dyes and more than 30 other ingredients from all U.S. private brand foods by January 2027 — a signal that the clean-label attributes national brands have long used to justify their price premium are now being systematically built into Walmart’s own portfolio.

Club’s Private Label Posture Is a Distinct Supplier Problem

Circana’s reports identify club and mass channels as the leading drivers of private label growth in the U.S., with club retailers posting the highest dollar share gain of any food retail channel. For 1P suppliers who manage Sam’s Club alongside their Walmart Supercenter business, that finding warrants its own analysis.

Member’s Mark accounts for roughly 30% of Sam’s Club dollar sales, a figure Sam’s Club leadership has confirmed publicly. At Walmart’s April 2025 investor community meeting, Chris Nicholas, who was then Sam’s Club President and CEO and has since become President and CEO of Walmart International, stated that Member’s Mark represents approximately 50% of the club’s merchandise sales growth over the past two years. Nicholas also told CNBC that Member’s Mark’s strength gives Sam’s Club leverage to push suppliers on both pricing and innovation. That framing — owned brand momentum as an explicit negotiation instrument — is a distinct commercial dynamic from the brand-building story at bettergoods. JBP and line review preparation at Sam’s Club should account for it separately from Supercenter planning. The cost structure differs, club pack velocity expectations differ, and a membership model that reinforces repeat purchase on owned brands produces sustained pressure that general merchandise retail does not.

For 3P Marketplace sellers, the pressure is different but not absent. Bettergoods reached 28% household penetration largely through in-store volume. As that penetration compounds and the brand builds loyalty, its presence in on-site search results for food and wellness categories will grow. Sellers in adjacent spaces — functional food, specialty snack, health and wellness — should consider that the trust gap between national and retail-owned brands is narrowing in consumer perception, not just in pricing.

What the EU Number Tells Suppliers That the U.S. Number Does Not

Circana’s global report shows private label holding a 50% unit share in the EU, with significant growth in countries like Spain and France. That figure is not directly comparable to the U.S. — different retail structures, different national brand investment histories, different consumer relationships with store brands. But it documents the endpoint of a trajectory the U.S. is on, and it shows what happens when national retailers invest consistently in owned brand quality over time.

Circana’s Lauren Hazenfield noted that retailers winning in this environment are building consumer connections through wellness, sustainability, and experiential product design. Walmart has structured bettergoods around those pillars from the start and is now extending clean-label commitments across its entire private brand portfolio. Two years of Numerator data confirm the brand is reaching the shoppers it was designed for.

For suppliers heading into line reviews or JBP conversations, the strategic answer to bettergoods is not a price response. Circana projects continued unit share growth for private label at a more measured pace, but more measured growth on a base of 24% unit share means national brands are defending ground rather than gaining it. The case that has to be made — equity built outside Walmart’s walls, marketing investment that grows the category rather than just converting existing buyers, innovation that reaches the market before Walmart has access to it — has to be made clearly, and made before the line review begins.

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