Walmart's EV charging network hit 50 active stations in the United States as of this interview, and is adding credit card payment terminals to every charger in its lineup -- a direct response to persistent feedback that requiring app-based payment locked out drivers who didn't want another account. Adam Happel, General Manager of Walmart EV Charging, joined The Arkansas eTraveler at the Springdale, Arkansas location -- near Walmart's home office -- to discuss what the company has built, what it's fixing, and where the network is headed. The conversation covered hardware vendors, port orientation changes already rolling out, Walmart Plus discount integration now going nationwide, a curbside grocery delivery pilot at charging stalls, and Happel's confident suggestion that public permit trackers are underestimating the pace of what's coming.
Walmart's position in the EV charging market is structurally different from every other network. ChargePoint and EVgo lease their real estate. Tesla owns its land. Walmart already owns or leases more than 5,000 US store locations, and approximately 90% of Americans live within 10 miles of one. That footprint -- if Walmart follows through over the next five to six years -- represents a potential charging destination network that no independent charging company could replicate without acquiring hundreds of separate real estate deals at market rates. The hardware choices reinforce that ambition: Walmart is deploying Alpitronic Hypercharger and ABB A400 units, both rated at 400 kW per cabinet with dual ports. These are among the fastest publicly deployed CCS chargers in the country. At 50 stations, the network is still small relative to its potential. But the infrastructure decisions being made now -- hardware quality, payment flexibility, retail integration -- are being made by a company that appears to be planning for a much larger build than what's visible today.
The port orientation correction Happel described is a useful window into how the network actually iterates. Early units placed CCS and NACS connectors in positions that drivers found physically awkward -- a configuration that seemed fine in testing but created frustration in daily use. Walmart is now reversing the port positions on all new installations and running a field campaign to update existing hardware. Site selection combines a proprietary data model tracking EV registration trends and predicted utilization with direct input from store managers, who hear from customers when demand is building at a specific location. Happel confirmed that Walmart Plus members now receive a discount on charging rates, which are rolling out nationally, and that off-peak time-of-use pricing drops as low as the low-20-cent-per-kWh range at some locations. The curbside delivery pilot assigns numbered EV parking spots to charging stalls so drivers can place a grocery order in advance and receive it at the car without interrupting their session.
Bottom line: Adding credit card terminals was the single most important thing Walmart could do to make this network accessible to drivers outside its core customer base, and Happel's willingness to say on camera that the team reads comments and adjusts hardware accordingly is a better answer than most charging executives give. The Walmart Plus integration and curbside delivery pilot are genuinely differentiated from anything Tesla, EVgo, or ChargePoint can offer. Whether the pace of expansion matches the scale of the ambition is still an open question -- but Happel's hint that permit trackers are missing a significant share of what's in the pipeline makes this network worth watching more closely than the current station count suggests.