Hi, good morning everyone, and welcome to our Walmart Day 2024. It's a pleasure to see you again, all of you in person. I'm Salvador Villaseñor, responsible of investor relations at Walmart, and on behalf of everyone, I want to welcome you, those who will come here in person, and also those who are joining us through our webcast. Thank you for joining us today and thank you for your interest in our company. As it is customary at these events, we will have several activities throughout the day for you to be able to learn a bit more about the strategy and meet our leaders. We will start the first part of the management presentations. After that, these presentations, then we will go to a couple of stores. We're going to be visiting Walmart Supercenter and Bodega Aurrerá format.
After the visit, we will return to the corporate offices for lunch with our leaders, and then we will go back to this auditorium for the second part of the presentation and the Q&A session. Before we begin, I would like to ask you if you could please read the legal notice on the screens. This notice and the presentations that we are about to see are going to be available at our website, www.walmart.mx, once this event is over. Now I will leave you with our CEO, Gui Loureiro. Thank you.
Gracias a todos. Good morning. My voice is bad because I got a cold. I don't have COVID. I tested negative, but I must admit that the doctor put me some injections, so I'm surviving. Good morning and welcome to our Walmart Day 2024. I want to thank you for being with us today. One more. That's my number nine, I think, Walmart Day. I want to give a special thanks to our long-term investors. Great to see you back. Today, I'm looking forward to showing you how our growth formula is working, driving value in every part of our business, and helping our customers to save money and live better.
You will see the success we are having growing our stores, the success we are having growing our new businesses, the success we are having using our reach to reduce prices to our customers, the success we are having growing our technologies, the success we are having growing our leadership on our organization. We believe we have the formula that will allow us to capitalize the growth potential of business in Mexico and Central America. We've been executing this growth formula since our foundation to give people access to more affordable products at our stores. More recently, we have expanded beyond the stores by providing access to the digital economy, focusing on what our customers need and want at a price they can afford. So we provide access to e-commerce, to internet and phone service, to primary healthcare, to education, to financial solutions, among others.
Today, I'm here to tell you that our growth formula is working. Throughout the day, you'll hear how we are leveraging the strength of our stores, our reach, our technology, our customer centricity, our talent, and above all, our purpose, which is the foundation of our growth formula. All of us have seen how technology has impacted our lives. Technology has made the impossible possible. Technology drives abundance. As business leaders, we are facing a choice. We are standing at a crossroads, and we have two possible paths. One path is to put technology first to maximize what's possible without considering potential implications, such as people involved.
We see another path, a path that uses technology to serve people and not the other way around, a path that helps our associates to work smarter, not harder, a path that helps us to free up our time to connect with our customers, a path that helps us to better serve our customers and help them to save money and time. This view has led us to evolve our purpose. We are a people-led, tech-powered, omnichannel retailer dedicated to helping people save money and live better. This purpose is what guides us every single day. We are a customer-centric retailer that serves our customers whenever, wherever they want. We are dedicated every single day to help them live their lives in a better way. The message I want to leave you today is that we are not growing every part of our business separately.
We are connecting every part of our business. This all starts with running great stores, which will always be our focus. We are building a business that is much more than the sum of the parts. We are building a business that will deliver more access to more products and services, more access to healthcare, more access to education. We are building a business that will deliver more value to our shareholders, more access to what the people of Mexico and Central America need for a better life today and tomorrow. By building a growth formula where the sum is bigger than all the parts, we are creating an exponential opportunity for Walmart to grow. Today, our leadership team will walk you through the main components of this formula: our purpose, our reach, our customer centricity, our technology, and our talent.
Dolores and Ignacio will give a perspective about our stores and omnichannel business. Later, Beatriz and Marcelo will present how we are accelerating our ecosystem, and after that, you'll visit our stores and experience the delivery of that strategy. Coming back from the store visit, we'll host a panel about our four enablers led by Alejandra, Tomás, Gastón, and Brian to talk to you about how we are driving technology and innovation for the benefit of our associates and customers. Then, Cristina will show how our business in Central America has evolved during the last few years and how it is leveraging and learning from what we do in Mexico. To finalize, Paulo will talk about the results that demonstrate that our winning formula is working and driving value creation. But let's begin with what are the successes that demonstrate that our growth formula is working.
One of the successes that proves that our formula is working is the fact that we've doubled the business in less than nine years. In 2014, at the same event, we committed to doubling the size of the company in 10 years. We are very proud we did it faster, and we'll do it again. As we doubled our business, we managed to further increase our already best-in-class ROIC from 14.7% in 2014 to 20.6% in 2023. Another one of the successes that proves our formula is working is the fact that in each one of the last 10 years, we grew same-store sales faster than the market measured by our ANTAD, year after year. Another of the successes is the fact that during the same period, we opened more than 920 stores despite COVID. Our stores are close to where our customers live.
Last year alone, we opened 162 new stores, and this year, we will accelerate our store expansion even more. Another success is that we sell approximately 63% (these numbers are from Mexico) more per square meter than our competitors. 63%. Our EDLC philosophy allows us to reduce prices. Lower prices bring more sales, and higher sales help us to further reduce costs. This productivity loop differentiates us and benefits our customers. Another success is that our on-demand operation expanded to 1,200 stores, and we have a profitable operation. We have rolled out on-demand services to Bodega customers at a price that they pay that is lower than what they used to spend on transportation. We help them to save time and money. One more success is that our e-commerce GMV, sorry, that our e-commerce penetration reached 6.8% of total GMV.
I know this is still behind the double-digit goal we shared and promised you four years ago, and now we explain what actions we are taking to grow faster and further. Another one of our successes proving our formula is working is the acceleration of our new businesses. We are giving millions of customers opportunities that open new doors, new doors to our services, new doors to the benefits of the digital world. As we invested on data and became even closer to our customers, they asked us to provide new services such as health, education, internet, and entertainment that were mostly outside of the traditional scope of a conventional retailer. In parallel, technology evolved dramatically, and many companies started to offer digital services.
So if traditional banks, brick-and-mortar banks, were not willing to open an account for our customers due to their very low balance power, new fintechs started to offer it. If our customers did not have resources nor the time needed to attend a school, digital schools became a very good alternative. The same with health and other services. However, to make it viable, we needed to overcome two major barriers. Number one, internet in Mexico was, before us, disproportionately expensive. Number two, companies providing digital services had a huge acquisition cost, which made it difficult for them to scale their products and to sell at lower prices. We found a way to overcome those two barriers. First, with Bait, we solved the problem of providing affordable internet.
Second, we managed to reduce the acquisition costs for the digital players by connecting them with the 5 million customers in Mexico that come to our stores every single day. When we started selling Bait at our stores, we did not know how to do it. So at the beginning, we made lots of mistakes. We could spend the whole day. We would have a lot of fun, but it's not the idea today. We learned, we adapted, and now we are growing faster than anyone in the market. Our customers also became more aware of the service, despite the fact our model had a lower advertising budget to make Bait even more affordable. Today, Bait Internet and Telephone Plan offers up to 7 x more megabytes than what the market leader offers for the same price. 7 x. It's not a mistake.
Our operation reached 11.8 million active users in December and continues to grow at an exponential rate, as you can see in the chart. You guys know, once you reach those numbers, you can start to monetize. We are repeating our winning formula with the health membership. We shared with you the launch of this product last year, and as you can see, it is starting to grow much faster because we have learned to develop our business in a more agile way. Last year, we sold 1.2 million health memberships and over 1 million patients were serviced at our doctor's offices and pharmacies at stores. This includes our first primary health clinic that started operations in Mexico City last year.
Another important success of the formula is that in 2023, Walmart Connect, our omni-retail media business, grew 34% versus the previous year, reaching MXN 3 billion in advertising income. The growth potential ahead of us is huge. Finally, we continue to expand our remittances, credit, and digital account service through Cashi. In 2023, we granted more than 500,000 credits to our customers, and in the fourth quarter alone, Cashi's TPV tripled versus 2022, and it is still a closing loop. Our formula resonates with our customers and with our associates. We welcome 5 million people to our stores in Mexico and 1 million people to our stores in Central America every single day. And in 2023, they rewarded us with their loyalty, as our NPS last year alone grew 420 basis points versus the previous year. We treasure the trust we've been building.
Last year, we reached an all-time high associate engagement score of 90%. This is 4 percentage points higher than the previous year. We have over 230,000 associates dedicated to driving the best possible experience to our customers. As Sam Walton used to say, "Take care of your associates, and you'll take care of your customers." Ali is going to say during the panel how much we reduced the turnover in our company, brutally. Last but not least, we have put together a very strong leadership. For illustration, talking about our key speakers for today, Dolores brings a depth of leadership experience, fostering customer centricity to grow the whole business stronger and faster. Ignacio is a natural digital innovator, focused on solving customer needs by disrupting traditional methods to drive business growth and success.
Beatriz is making massive progress to give every Mexican and Central American access to a better present and better future. Mache is committed to building disruptive financial solutions to provide more value and opportunities to our customers. Cristina excels at driving impactful change, spurring growth, and showcasing relentless determination. And finally, Paulo is a curious and optimistic leader, determined to generate value creation to all stakeholders. You can see that each one of our leaders brings tremendous determination and experience to serve our customers and accelerate growth. Our leaders are committed to a servant leadership culture that inspires. Our leaders are committed to working together to achieve our purpose by improving the lives of people in Mexico and Central America. Now, what are the strengths of our ecosystem that drive our growth formula? One of these strengths is having great stores.
We welcome 6 million people every day in Mexico and Central America. Stores that are close to where our customers live. Stores that sell more per square meter. Stores that enable digital connection with non-digital customers through our kiosks and our associates. Stores that offer up to 8,000 SKUs and serve as a picking point for the millions of SKUs we sell online. Stores that are led by people that serve people. Stores that generate trust and loyalty. Another strength is our Everyday Low Price and Everyday Low-Cost philosophy. We have lower prices and lower costs versus our competitors. We value each cent we negotiate on behalf of them, and we value each cent when we manage our expenses. One more strength is that we have an omnichannel business, a true omnichannel business, that serves our customers whenever, wherever, and however they want.
A key strength of our system is that we have become a platform that connects our customers with the benefits of the digital economy. We are that link that enables customers to access the services and products they want and need at a price they can afford because we negotiate those prices to them, just like Bait, Health, Cashi, and Education. Another strength is our ability to leverage Walmart in global sourcing, technology, supply chain, talent, among others. One more strength is our focus on the customer. Last year, you met Andrea, Carlos, and Lucy. We have invested in getting to know them better, and this has allowed us to better serve their needs and solve their pain points. Another strength of our growth formula is our resilience. We know, and I told you last quarter, Walmart Supercenter, Walmart Express, and our 1P e-commerce business are current areas of opportunity.
We are learning from our mistakes and taking the necessary actions to turn around performance, to acquire new capabilities, change, and adapt. We are determined to learn and succeed, and we have seen some improvements that we are going to share with you today. The most important strength of our system is having the best talent that drives our strategy. As we implement our strategy, we remain committed to become a regenerative company by 2040, meaning that we are aiming to have a positive influence in the environment, society, and economy. Our regenerative strategy is focused on four strategic pillars: opportunity, sustainability, community, and ethics and integrity. We believe those are the greatest strengths of our system, which will drive our formula growing forward. As we look into the future, what are the goals our growth formula will allow us to achieve 10 years from now?
We believe our formula has all the elements that will allow us to continue to deliver to our customers in the future and accelerate growth. Again, it always starts with our stores. If the stores are not good, forget the rest. One of our goals for the future is to be even closer to our customers. We will accelerate our expansion plan while enhancing our omnichannel retail capabilities. We will build fully automated omnichannel distribution centers and fulfillment centers, merging or continue to merge our online and offline operations in order to deliver a unified and improved customer experience. Today, we are 10 minutes away from almost 90% of the population in the top metro areas, and in the future, we will be even closer. Another of our goals for the future is to further expand our position as an omnichannel player in Mexico and Central America.
We believe we can double the size of our business again, this time in less time than it took the last time. Our e-commerce operations will strengthen and expand even further. We will invest to improve our digital platforms and delivery models powered by Walmart to ensure a seamless, convenient, and enjoyable shopping experience for our customers. Another goal for the future is to use digital to come closer to our customers in order to know them better and serve them better. We are very excited to share with you that next quarter, we will roll out our new digital connection program, something that I particularly fall in love with. Customers provide their phone number at the checkout, and once they register, we get to know each of them better by analyzing every interaction with us.
We have tested this program in three states for two years now with strong results. Half of the adult population signed up to the program, and among other results, sales increased as customers became even more loyal and acquired Bait, health, and other services. By scaling this program, we will be able to learn from our customers' behavior and offer them tailor-made experiences. This will create a stronger connection with them and better decision-making. They will have a single sign-on, and we have a simple way to manage their multiple interactions with our businesses thanks to interconnected systems and data. And don't worry, we are not going to give 2% rebate. There's no rebate, and this follows complete everyday low-price rules.
Another goal for the future is to further expand and invest in our service by providing Walmart customers full access to primary healthcare, credit, remittances, connectivity, educational options, all of them at a price they can afford through the digital economy. One more goal for the future is to have an even stronger Walmart connected business. Our suppliers will benefit from increased returns on their advertising investments, and our customers will benefit from an enhanced experience as connected income will be reinvested in prices and in our ecosystem. Our last goal for the future is to continue investing in having digitally enabled, better paid, and better trained associates serving our customers. We are very energized and excited about how our formula is leading us to the Walmex of the future. Our formula is helping people in Mexico and Central America to live better.
Our formula is also creating value for all our stakeholders. To build the Walmex of the future, we need trusted leaders who are driving innovations and our winning formula. You already know most of our leaders. Let me just introduce to you our two new recent additions: Cristina, our recently appointed and the first female CEO for Walmart Central America; and Brian, our Chief Technology Officer. As you can see, there are 14 members in our executive committee, and there are more than 230,000 associates out there in our stores, in our clubs, in our DCs, and in our offices. More than 230,000 people united by our purpose and empowered by our winning formula. Going forward, we are determined to accelerate growth in all parts of our business. We are determined to deliver even more value to our shareholders.
And altogether, we are determined to make a difference in the lives of all the people in Mexico and Central America every single day. I hand it over to Ignacio and Dolores to talk about the strength of our reach stores and omnichannel business. Thank you very much.
Hello. Good morning, everyone. Thank you. It's great to see you all here today, and thank you for your interest in our company. I'm Ignacio Caride, COO of Walmart Mexico, and I'm here today with Dolores Fernández Lobbe, our Chief Merchandise Officer. We are excited to talk to you about how our growth formula is propelling us forward, how our growth formula is allowing us to deliver our strategy executing our three priorities: to win in discount, to lead in omnichannel, and to become the ecosystem of choice. A lot has happened since we set these three priorities in 2020.
Since then, we're starting connecting our stores and our e-commerce business in a more intentional way to become a true omni-organization, an omnichannel player powered by our stores, powered by our technology, powered by our talent, and above all, powered by our growth formula, by our purpose to help people save money and live better. So what are the results that demonstrate that our growth formula is really working? The first result is that we are consistently winning at our core. Our stores are the heart of our ecosystem, and running great stores is a key differentiator as they continue to be the main point of access to serve customers. We keep getting closer and closer to them by accelerating our store expansion. In 2023, we reached a record of 148 new stores opening in Mexico, and this marks the highest number of openings in the last 10 years.
Another one of the results is that we are winning in the merchandise with merchandise and value. Those two elements have been in our formula for years, and they are the most fundamental element for winning in retail. Our strong relationship with suppliers allows us to curate the best items for our customers with the best value. A great example of this is a Barbie event we held last year. We jumped into the pink trend by offering 200 items across nine categories, from food to apparel. The Barbie fashion doll grew over 118%, and overall, our toy category share of market increased 210 basis points. What makes us the proudest, it was a truly omni-event. By this, Barbie drove 87% growth in on-demand and allowed us to reach our sales plan for the event in half the time we expected.
Our stores and platforms are open to all big and small suppliers, including, of course, our own brand suppliers. Last year, we launched more than 800 of our brand items, aiming to offer our customers high-quality products at prices they can afford. This led to 125 basis points market share penetration. When you combine great items and great prices, customers really notice it. In 2023, our price perception increased 120 basis points versus 2022. How are we building price perception? Of course, we have a formula for that too. First, a wide and sustained price gap. We continue to invest to improve our price positioning. We add our brands that, besides driving loyalty, our brands offer products at a much lower price while driving higher profitability that is later reinvested in price.
Next, we streamline communication, and we're making it clear and simple for our customers to identify the lowest prices. Now, we are adding another element to our price perception formula: technology. With technology, we are enabling our merchants with tools and data to make them more targeted and efficient investments to further improve our price positioning while maintaining profitability. Another of the results is our progress towards becoming a truly omni-company. We have made many changes in this direction, from revamping our technology to merging our teams. There is now one end-to-end view towards serving our customers' omni-needs, and they are noticing it. In 2023, our digital business grew faster than the industry, delivering a 23% increase versus 2022. With such growth, digital penetrations reached 6.8%. In Walmart formats, where digital adoption is higher, digital penetrations reached 11%. Our strategy demands even more.
Later on, I will talk about the plans we have to accelerate digital growth. Last year's growth was underpinned by a solid performance in our marketplace. We doubled our catalog, enabling customers access to a wider range of products and services. We improved our technology, making our marketplace even more competitive and attractive to our customers and sellers. As a result, our marketplace delivered a 40% growth versus 2022. On-demand is still the other pillar of our digital strategy, and I just need to accept this. I really love our on-demand model. It's such a great business model. It's a model where we leverage our stores. We reach our customers fast thanks to our footprint, and we can offer thousands of items in a matter of hours. The best of all, it's profitable.
Last year, we expanded our on-demand operation to all three Bodega formats, covering now 650 Bodega stores. This includes our big Bodega formats with Mi Bodega Aurrerá in rural areas and the proximity formats, Bodega Aurrerá Express. Looking at on demand across all our business, in 2023, we delivered more than 22 million orders across our 1,200 units. It's important to mention one thing: 99% of those are delivered on the same day. 22 million orders delivered on the same day. We continue to be the main destination for our home grocery shopping in Mexico. In 2023, we increased the number of new customers more than 45%, along with a 2.5x increase in customer retention. I am really, really proud of what we have achieved, and I want to really thank our associates for their great effort.
I believe these results show that our growth formula is working. But of course, we recognize that we have some growth challenges in some areas, like our particular Walmart in our 1P operation. But we have the focus, the strategy, and the talent to turn around those issues and move forward. I'm very glad to see that some of our plans are already starting to show results. Now, I want to take it over to Dolores, and she will talk about the opportunity we see to continue to win in discount.
Thanks, Ignacio, and good morning, everybody. It's great to see you all here. At our core, we are merchants in Walmart. Winning in discount, winning in our stores is the foundation for becoming the ecosystem of choice. Which are the initiatives in winning discount that will help us accelerate the growth of our business in 2024? One of the initiatives is EDLP, our EDLP philosophy: having low prices every day builds trust with our customers. Our goal for 2024 is to increase our price perception twofold versus what we reported this year. We will do so by further investing in pricing, enhancing our brands, adjusting our communication, and strengthening the consistency of EDLP.
Our Morralla program that you will see in the stores in Bodega is a great example of this. It used to be a campaign that we ran twice a year, where you would find a wide variety of amazing products at the lowest price points. Last year, we made the decision to make Morralla a permanent program, increasing the penetration in tickets by 30%.
This shows that our customers love the program, and it improves our price perception. Another initiative is to further reinforce our fresh categories. We will keep improving quality and experience while we move forward in the transformation of our operations. This involves centralizing processes and integrating vertically with suppliers to better serve the customers. So far, we have transformed our fresh operations in 80% of our stores, and in 2024, we will complete the transformation to all of them. In parallel, we will enhance our meat processing plants and bakery hub facilities. Our goal is to improve quality, availability, and experience to drive more traffic to our stores. Our improvements are being well received by our customers. Fresh NPS increased last year 700 basis points, and in 2024, we aim to increase it even more. Another initiative is to expand to strengthen our private brands.
During 2024, we will continue to innovate faster and better, tapping into new categories powered by Walmart's global sourcing infrastructure. We see the opportunity to give more access to our customers to great products at the lowest prices. Let me share some facts. First, our brands today reach 88% of Mexican households, and 80% of Mexicans consider Aurrerá as the lowest price range in Mexico. Another example: last year, Great Value in snacks grew more than 340 basis points in market share, and it grew 4.5 x more than the rest of the market. And also, on higher value items, and not only on food and consumables, for example, our brand Atvio grew more than 400 basis points in market share in the home appliance category, growing 1.5 x above the brand leader.
These data points show that our customers trust our brands and that it goes beyond food and consumables. This is why we reinforce our commitment to double our brand's penetration in the next years. Another initiative is to keep leveraging the collaboration with our commercial partners to provide our customers with the best assortment, innovation, and value. We have many examples, as Ignacio showed before, based on our strategic relationships. We were able to develop great seasonal events, sustainability initiatives, or be the platform for innovation. They have seen the value of our ecosystem, and they are developing their commercial plans to leverage different parts of it. Our small and medium suppliers, which represent 85% of our supplier base, play a key role in the assortment we offer regionally and nationally to our customers.
This is why we keep expanding our Adopta una Pyme program to help our small suppliers grow. The last initiative is productivity. Technology allows us to drive more efficiencies. We are focused on implementing new tools in our core to simplify processes. You will see many examples of what we are doing in the store basis today, but let me share a couple of those. One example is Promo Etiqueta, a project that simplified the execution of price changes, reducing the number of hours dedicated to the activity. It saved our associates from walking 133 km at the same time, reducing the usage of 230 tons of paper, equal to saving almost 4,000 trees. Another example of a new tool you will see during your store visit is RFID, or radio frequency.
This technology drives huge improvement in productivity while improving omnichannel inventory, visibility, and the flow in our supply chain. With this technology and collaboration with our suppliers, a task that used to take our associates 70 hours now takes only 3 hours. This is a great example of how, by leveraging technology, we drive productivity. I don't want to spoil all the examples, and I'm sure you will see them at the stores today. And last but not least, as Gui mentioned earlier, we are committed to generate a positive influence in the environment, the economy, and the society. That's why another part of our formula is being a regenerative company. We have many initiatives I am very proud of, and let me share just two examples of them today. The first one is that by 2025, 100% of the private brands' packaging will be sustainable.
The second one is our small farmers' program. In the last 10 years, we have supported more than 30,000 farmers, creating the conditions for their growth and increasing their income by more than 40%. In the next two years, we will add more than 5,000 new small farmers to the program. Now, Ignacio, please tell us what we are doing to continue leading in omnichannel.
Thank you, Dolores. We see great potential ahead. We are on the right path, and we are confident that we have the growth formula to lead in omnichannel. So what are the initiatives that will help us accelerate our growth in the omni-space? First, starting with on-demand. One of the initiatives is to increase customer acquisition.
Today, we are the main destination for our grocery home shopping, and in 2024, we'll plan to continue investing further to improve our value proposition and our customer experience. Our stores are the key to propel on-demand forward, and we plan to keep expanding the service nationwide. The second initiative is to accelerate Walmart Pass In 2024, we will focus on increasing membership, traffic, and experience, and expanding the complementary service for greater adoption of the ecosystem. Another initiative looking to reach faster, more customers is to expand our express delivery service Pronto. We are investing to increase our capabilities to deliver more orders in less time, and we are expanding the service so orders can reach customers in less than 90 minutes. Another initiative is the expansion of the Bodega Despensa a tu Casa.
In 2024, we will get closer to more customers by enabling the service in around 150 additional Bodega stores. Now, regarding extended assortment, one of the key initiatives for 2024 is the revamping of our value proposition in general merchandise. We know that in this acceleration context of digital channels, these categories are the ones that need to transform the most, and we are working on catalog differentiation and our omnichannel experience as main drivers. Another initiative is to continue to accelerate our marketplace while taking care of the experience through Walmart Fulfillment Services. Currently, 70% of the orders are delivered in less than 48 hours. We will continue leveraging our omni-logistic capabilities for marketplace sellers to deliver even faster.
In addition, to provide a broad offer of extended assortment, we will leverage the cross-border model to double the volume by adding around 10 million SKUs to our catalog this year. Lastly, on omnichannel experience, a key initiative is to leverage our Walmart U.S. technology. We are implementing a platform that will allow us to integrate sellers and SKUs from the U.S., Canada, and China. This will expand our catalog to millions of SKUs and hundreds of thousands of sellers. With the power of technology, we have improved our checkout experience with better navigation, integrating more product information, reviews, ratings, among others. In 2024, we will make a significant leap towards a personalized, friendly, and seamless digital experience for our customers. Also, this year, Cashi will gain more relevance as payment solutions and giving access to advanced customers to our digital business.
Mache will explain more details later on the presentation. Additionally, Walmart Connect, our omni-retail media business, will allow us to connect customers to suppliers by communicating details about products and improving the omnichannel experience, but while we are monetizing our assets. Beatriz also will give us a little bit more context later today. Powered by technology and leveraging our core business, the omni-returns initiative will be implemented in 2024 to create a seamless return online purchase. This is that customers will be able to carry out a return process at any of our stores in a simplified way, and it will take less than two minutes. Now, I turn it over again to Dolores, who will share more details on our strategy and omnichannel assortments.
Thanks, Ignacio. Last year, we talked about our omni-assortment strategy, where, through a data-driven model, we defined which categories had the highest potential in brick, click, or in an omnichannel way. As a result, during 2023, we added 9 million SKUs to our extended assortment. This boosted our online sales, and in some categories like home and technology, we achieved record online sales share. This 2024, we will go further. This 2024, we will strengthen the connection between the stores and the digital world, among others, increasing the number of showrooms that we have in our Walmart stores, highlighting our extended assortment catalog that we have online. In 2024, we will further invest to elevate our best-in-class omni-merchandising talent.
Last week, we launched our first-ever Omni Merchant Academy, where our merchants will learn to leverage new technology tools to connect everything we know from our customers, our stores, and our full ecosystem. We are helping our merchants work smarter and faster to make the best decisions on behalf of our customers. In 2024, we will implement new tools leveraging customer knowledge and data to empower our omnichannel business. I am very proud to share that this year, we will launch Luminate. Luminate is a suite of products that provide deeper-than-ever insights into Walmart stores and shoppers. Luminate is about shared insights, stronger decisions together with our suppliers. This will allow us to improve customers' experience even more. When Walmart suppliers and merchants have access to the same robust omni-data, great things happen.
Lastly, another of our goals for 2024 is to leverage our strong relation with commercial partners to develop the best omni-assortment and solutions for our customers. We want to grow with them by developing a global assortment. We want to grow with them leveraging our supply chain network. We want to grow with them to develop our strong omnichannel business.
I'm really excited about the opportunity ahead of us, about how, by winning in discount and leading in omnichannel, we will accelerate growth, about how our growth formula is propelling us forward. Our formula has proven to be successful over the years. Some customers want to shop digital. Some customers want to shop at stores. Some customers want to do both. We can serve them all. Thank you very much. Now, I will leave you with Beatriz Núñez, who will explain the third category strategy, Become the Ecosystem of Choice. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Dolores and Ignacio, and good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us today. My name is Beatriz Núñez. I'm responsible for the growth office, and today, I'm very excited to talk about how we are becoming the ecosystem of choice. Earlier today, you heard how we have expanded beyond stores by providing access to the digital economy, focusing on what our customers need at the price they can afford. Some of you may wonder, why are we going beyond stores? Why beyond omni? It all started when we asked Andrea, our customer, how can we serve you better? She said, "I need to maximize my budget. I need internet access always. I need credit. I need help with my family health," and so on. Andrea has so many omni-needs. So how can we help Andrea? How can we solve her main pain points?
By understanding her needs and leveraging the trust she has on us, we embarked on a journey to solve her main pain points. The first thing we learned was that many of her needs could only be solved through digital. Technology made the impossible possible and allowed us to offer solutions to Andrea at the price she can afford. We had to find digital solutions for her and use our EDLP and EDLC philosophy to make them affordable. We have learned how to use our stores as customer acquisition points, where we recruit customers both digital and non-digital. Our acquisition cost is minimum, and this is one of the main costs of the digital players. For every need that Andrea has, there were already many digital players trying to solve it.
However, their cost was still too high, so they couldn't offer Andrea affordable prices, and they couldn't build a viable business. We learned that we can be the platform that connects our digital and non-digital business partners with our customers, reducing acquisition costs, negotiating affordable prices that Andrea can pay on her behalf, and making the business still viable thanks to our reach. This is a win-win-win solution. Does it sound like the same formula that our founder used when we opened stores? We are on a journey to become the platform that connects customers with products and services on the digital world, leveraging our customer base, on a journey to become the ecosystem of choice, to help Andrea to lead better and create a viable business to our partners and to us. Ignacio and Dolores talk about how we are winning in discount and leading in omni.
Becoming the ecosystem of choice builds upon these two priorities to go even further and accelerate growth. Along with Mache, we will take you through each key vertical of the ecosystem. I will start with Bait, our telecom service. Bait addresses Andrea's main pain point by offering telephone and unlimited internet services at the price she can afford. In Mexico, internet penetration remains low given telecom companies' high prices. Mobile internet is around 78% and home internet about 57%. Bait has come to disrupt this space. Our customers want and need internet during the whole month. Now, they need it even more with the new services we are starting to offer to them. Internet is the door of the benefits of the digital economy. But with current prices, customers either have it or only when they have money or they don't have it at all.
Bait is solving this problem and opening the door to health, education, entertainment, and more. Let me share with you Andrea's journey in Bodega. When Andrea visits Bodega, she discovers Bait. She realizes our service gives her 7 x more megabytes than her current carrier. She joins Bait. She's surprised with the Bait speeds and experience. But what she values the most is that she gets free megabytes every time she shops at Bodega. Our suppliers have invited her to get more connectivity for free by interacting with their brands in our stores. She gets what she needs. She's connected all the time through Bait. So what are the results that demonstrate our growth formula is working in this vertical of the ecosystem? The first result is growth. Our number of users is growing exponentially.
We ended 2023 with 11.8 million Bait active users after only four years of operation. The second result is traffic. Each active Bait customer visits 2x per month to top up, increasing average traffic 20% versus non-Bait users. Another result is digitizing our customers by enabling them to become omni-customers and by doing so, their frequency and ticket increases. We are very proud of Bait's results. We have become the MVNO number one in Mexico. So what are the opportunities we see for Bait going forward? We see a huge opportunity to continue to grow by adding more active users. We see a huge opportunity in devices and value-added services. Telcos have more than 50% of mobile phone market share, bundling connectivity, cell phones, entertainment services, and credit. We can tackle this opportunity in an asset-light way.
Leveraging our stores and platforms, we can do so with almost no CapEx investment. Bait is a great example of how our growth formula is working. Now, repeating the formula, let's talk about our health vertical. I was moved when I heard Andrea, just like 72% of Mexicans cannot afford private health. Actually, 51% of us Mexicans don't have access even to public services. That means that anytime Andrea or someone in her family gets sick, they incur a very high unexpected expense. The out-of-pocket spend in health service events is close to 40%. We realize we could use our reach and technology to help Andrea. Her journey begins when she visits our store. She goes to one of our 1,500 in-store pharmacies for medicine and advice. 36% of Mexicans attend a doctor's office adjacent to the pharmacy. You will see this later at store.
At the pharmacy, our associate offers her the health membership for less than $ 2 per month. The membership includes one free visit to our 500 in-store doctors' offices or at our health clinic. She gets unlimited consultations 24/7 with our remote doctors. She also gets 5% of discount on her prescription in one of our 1,500 Bodega, Walmart, or Sam's pharmacies, all of these for only MXN 30. The health membership is a great example of how we are becoming a platform to connect customers with the digital world. We connected our in-store pharmacies and doctors' offices with digital health services. So what are the results that demonstrate our formula is working also in this health vertical? The first result is growth. Last year, we sold 1.2 million memberships. The second result is that the average ticket of a customer who purchased the membership was 4x bigger.
Another result is traffic. The membership drives 16% of the traffic into the doctor's offices located in our stores. We perform more than 1 million healthcare services to patients at our doctor's offices, at store, and healthcare clinic at affordable prices. In parallel, the partner that provides the telemedicine service got a huge number of patients with a little acquisition cost so they can build a viable business despite the low prices they charge. Another result is innovation to serve customers even better on the health space. Last year, we launched a primary healthcare clinic proof of concept here in Mexico City. This clinic offers a center for diagnosis, laboratories, specialist medical care, and treatment at affordable prices. It has performed over 10,000 services in few months. The preliminary results are exciting. So what are the opportunities we see for our health business going forward?
We will continue to reinforce our pharmacy, expand our doctor's offices, and our health membership to more services and customers. In 2024, we will broaden our pilot with three more primary healthcare clinics. We are working together with suppliers and other digital partners to improve the health of Andrea and her family through a better diet, exercise routine, among others. Our goal is to double our health business in the next five years. Now, I would like to introduce the next vertical, the most recent one, education. The current situation and challenge of education in México can be summarized in two facts. 89% of people can only have access to public schools. The average education is 9.7 years, equivalent to complete middle school. Andrea wishes for her children to be among the 30% of Mexicans who obtain a high school certificate and obtain opportunities she never had.
We want to help Mexicans to keep studying and reach better income opportunities. We create an education program through partnerships with digital players and a top school in Mexico. We launched a proof of concept to provide Andrea's family an opportunity. Starting in $100, they can receive the education that will allow them to get a high school certificate in four months. There are other courses available as well. The preliminary results are encouraging, and we are planning to scale in the next 12 months. In parallel, we are also making education available to our own associates. Last year, 2,500 of our associates graduated. Bait, health, and e ducation are the verticals that are allowing us to connect with Andrea beyond stores. They are the new services, the new opportunities, the new doors we are opening for customers in the digital world.
Now, I will talk about a vertical that is a little bit different from the other three verticals. It is Walmart Connect, our omni-retail media business. Walmart Connect drives advertiser sales by increasing their connection with Andrea, communicating the benefits of our products, informing her about opportunities to maximize value for her money, and improving her shopping experience. Walmart Connect is fully omnichannel, and this is very valued by our advertisers. As of today, our advertising revenue comes from physical stores, e-commerce, and verticals of the ecosystem. So what are the results that demonstrate our growth formula is working in this vertical? One of the results is growth. In 2023, we grew revenue by 34% versus 2022, reaching MXN 3 billion. This positioned us among the top five advertising companies in Mexico. We worked with more than 600 advertisers, and we implemented over 7,600 campaigns, representing 32% of growth versus 2022.
We deliver omni-solutions and accelerate growth for advertisers of all sizes, top advertisers, and our marketplace sellers. Another one of the results is innovation. Walmart Connect is a great example of how technology drives abundance. We have built new capabilities as retailtainment, achieving a triple-digit growth, and advanced technology tools. These revenue streams offset cost increases in our business, allowing us to keep prices low for our customers. So what are the opportunities we see for Walmart Connect going forward? By 2028, our projections indicate a four-fold increase over our 2023 figures. We anticipate maintaining our double-digit annual growth. We are taking retail media to the next level. No other platform can correlate online and in-store activity like Walmart. Walmart Connect provides a holistic view of Walmart customer behavior and creates accountable, measurable results for our advertisers in Mexico and Central America.
As Dolores mentioned, this year, we will launch Walmart Luminate, a collaborative tool for our suppliers with shared data and a sharper view of the customer store and e-commerce. Luminate will help suppliers and merchants collaborate closer than ever before. We are ready for faster and more impactful decision-making powered at every touchpoint. These verticals together with our omni-retail media allow us to become the platform that connects our customers with the benefits of the digital economy, to become the ecosystem of choice. But we don't stop there. We are seeing an opportunity to reinforce our connection with Andrea even further. In 2024, we will roll out our new digital connection program. The digital connection starts by Andrea providing us her phone number, and with that, we will be able to analyze every transaction she does within our ecosystem.
We will know her much better, and we will also be able to connect directly with her and create special and differentiated experiences. We will provide her an easy way to manage her multiple interactions with us. We piloted this program for more than two years, and we have seen positive customer interest. We tested, we iterate, we learn, and we are ready for national rollout. This program will bring us so much value for Andrea by analyzing each one of our interactions with her. Our program will help her to discover products and services. We'll allow her to complete missions to win benefits. We will give her access to the benefits of our ecosystem. We'll allow us to communicate with her in a more relevant way to expand her budget value. This program will also bring great value for Walmart.
It will increase loyalty and stickiness, and it will generate growth as it increases frequency and ticket. Our plan is to implement the digital connection program in the second quarter of 2024. I'm very excited to see how we are connecting every part of our business to deliver more value for customers and shareholders. Our growth formula is working and propelling our ecosystem forward. We truly believe we are positioning to become the ecosystem of choice for our customers. Thank you so much for being here today. Now, I will lead with Mache, who will conduct a deep dive into financial solutions. Thank you.
Good morning. I'm very happy to be here with you once again. My name is Marcelino Herrera Vegas, but everyone calls me Mache, as you have seen. I'm in charge of financial solutions for Mexico and Central America. As Beatriz just mentioned, we have the right formula to provide our customers solutions for all their unmet needs inside and outside retail. Low access to the financial system is one of the main points that our customers face. Through our financial solutions, we want to improve our customers' lives, providing them with access to convenient, safe, and easy-to-use solutions like a digital wallet, credit, and remittances collections. Our variety of financial solutions continues to gain relevance. Today, we have a wider range of solutions that closed 2023 with strong results.
Regarding Cashi, our digital wallet, we more than doubled the active customers base in the last quarter and almost tripled the value of payments processed through our application, thanks to our e-commerce integration and the expansion of our payment service offering. I will expand on Cashi's future capabilities in a moment. For credit, we increased 11% the number of granted credits versus 2022, which means that more people had access to our everyday low prices in the way they can afford for them. In remittances, we increased our transactions by 10%, growing above the market. This was a direct consequence of the improvements we made in the collection experience, which we will continue improving more and more with new innovative solutions.
Our growth formula has been successful by not only looking at direct customers' pain points but also solving our suppliers' needs to guarantee that they continue offering the best products and prices for our customers. By offering the possibility of anticipating payments during 2023, we reached a 32% income growth in our factoring business versus prior year. In 2024, even greater things are coming. This year, Cashi will evolve into an open platform with many features. We are very excited about our Cashi account launch, with which our wallet will become an open-loop financial platform. This will allow us to expand the range of financial solutions we offer to our customers, consequently adding features such as a level two account where customers may receive up to MXN 24,000 per month.
This account will be connected to the SPEI system to receive and make transfers from and to any bank, our physical debit card as well as a digital debit card to make safe online purchases, cash deposits and withdrawals at our more than 3,000 stores with the app, and withdrawals at any ATM with our debit card, also the capability to receive digital remittances. This is just the beginning. Now, I'm going to show you a demo where we will see the upgrade of a current user who decides to open a Cashi account. Remember that anyone can use Cashi by enrolling with their full name, cell phone number, and email. So let me show you how the experience of opening an account looks like. Let's imagine that I'm a Cashi user, and I'm interested in knowing more about the account. So there is no cost.
It does not require a minimum balance and has no monthly commission. Among the main benefits, I can receive money and send it to any Cashi or bank account. I have more than 3,000 stores where I can withdraw money or do it at any ATM. I can use the digital card instantly, and I will purchase a physical debit card like this one for MXN 50 at any store, which will be credited automatically to my account. Okay, so let's start opening the account. I type my cell phone number. I receive the PIN to validate it. I write my email. I confirm it with another code. Now, I must create a password with certain rules. I confirm it. It asks me to validate my identity. I take out my INE ID. I take a picture of the front, another one from the back.
I answer some questions like my occupation, the use that I will give to the account, my source of income, how much will I receive monthly, and how often will I use the account, and ready. Now, I have my Cashi account. Let's go to my account. I can see the card for the account I've just opened on the homepage. I tap to access the financial features of my account. From deposit, I access my account data, which I can share with anyone. From transfer, I can send money to any account. From the digital card, I see what I need to make safer purchases with a dynamic CVV.
If I decide to go back, I return to the Cashi home, where I also access the features that I already use, such as seeing my balance, seeing the promotions, paying for services, or topping up my cell phone, and other features that soon users will also be able to access on their accounts. Without a doubt, this checking account represents financial inclusion and personal growth for our customers and members. For Walmart and the financial solutions team, this milestone is driven by our purpose of helping our customers save money and live better. But as I told you, this is just the beginning. We will continue integrating our ecosystem to become a one-stop shop for our customers. In the future, we will have an integrated ecosystem that will allow us to fulfill our purpose through different areas of our customers' lives.
This means that Andrea will be able to receive her remittances directly in Cashi, saving her time and adding security to the collection process. We will also have tools that enable users to improve their financial health, like bill payment reminders, to avoid service interruptions and extra charges due to delays, and help them use their money in an efficient way, have access to our EDLI, Everyday Low Installments . This means that Andrea can take advantage of our everyday low prices on general merchandise items in the way she can pay for them. It is not about having the lowest interest rates. It is about having the lowest installments for the same products at the same amount of installments. Our Cashi credits will become more accessible because we will know Andrea much better through the integration of our digital connection program.
Andrea will be able to also buy insurance products and accessible guarantees in her Cashi app to protect her mobile phone, computer, TV, and a lot more against unforeseen events. And of course, she will have access to other solutions from the Walmart ecosystem through the same app. Together with the solutions that Betty recently presented, our growth formula allows us to be ready to break access barriers and deliver quality experience in all areas of our customers' lives.
We are more than the parts of our business. We are now an integrated ecosystem that is changing how our customers interact with the world. Today, we are building the future where we want to see a future where every customer is valued, every need is met, and every experience is personalized. Thanks again for your interest in our company. I'm very excited about Walmart's financial solutions outlook. Thank you.
Good afternoon. I hope you all had a great visit to the stores and hopefully a great lunch. This morning, we shared our progress on the three strategic priorities of our strategy: win in discount, lead in omni, and be the ecosystem of choice. These three priorities are reinforced by our four enablers: technology, customer centricity and data, supply chain and people. Over the next few moments, together with Tomás, Gastón, and Alejandra, we're going to share with you how technology is a catalyst across our core strategy. Our technology strategy leverages the global reach of Walmart. We're building disruptive technology solutions that allow our customers to interact with us digitally and in an entirely connected ecosystem. Our solutions grant a frictionless experience for our customers, giving them access to our products across each of our banners and across all of our verticals, including Bait, Cashi, health, and education.
I want to share with you the five areas where technology is driving a differentiated experience across our enterprise. First, we're building solutions that allow us to know our customer on a personal and intimate basis. Solutions such as our digital assistant allow Andrea to interact with us as she chooses across our apps via WhatsApp or by voice. Second, our ecosystem of modules connected across our global platforms drive a seamless interaction and orchestration across our stores and across each of our verticals. Our common customer identity, our single sign-on solution, enables traceability of our customer interactions at every step and allows us to be there with our customer through the experience to drive better insights and allows us to be there in the shopping experience, improving our store experience across all of our digital channels.
Third, by creating a connected ecosystem of platforms across all of our domains, we create an AI-driven insight that helps us push the boundary of productivity and efficiency. This happens across our stores, across our supply chain, and across our home office. Our automated price change engine allows our team members to now spend the time where they need to, which is with our customers. Fourth, utilizing our global platforms and artificial intelligence, we improve all of our decisions using the breadth of data across all of Walmart. Solutions such as Luminate allow our suppliers and our merchants to see the likely outcomes of their sales across the banners and digital formats. It lets them make the right choices, maximizing their reach for the benefit of our mutual customers. And lastly, and it's important that we don't forget, while we are technology-powered, we remain at our core a people-led company.
Our solutions serve to improve the lives of every associate, improving their productivity. Solutions such as Merch One help our merchants make the right choices surrounding our products and our inventory. With artificial intelligence, we help to optimize those decisions, and we do that at velocity. The next generation of technology allows our associates to work smarter, not harder. Tomás, leading our newly created customer office now for approximately the past 18 months, tell us a little bit about how do you see technology enabling the journey of customer centricity?
Sure, Brian. Thank you so much. The customer office mission is to contribute to win the heart and loyalty of our customers. In order to do so, we need to transform millions of data points to insights, actions, but finally, and most valuable, results. With this in mind, technology becomes a key enabler to keep evolving as a customer-centric company, mainly in three areas: understand the customer, serve them better, and finally engage better with them. In order to understand the customer, every year, we receive millions of contacts through different channels, especially service at the stores, e-commerce, or our customer care. Technology actually helps us to work smarter, not harder, by reading millions of comments, reading the sentiments behind, transforming them into concrete recommendations to make a better customer experience.
Customer feedback through our NPS program goes all the way from the stores to multiple corporate teams and has a real influence on strategy and execution, but most importantly, in result. Last year, we grew 420 basis points in NPS, leading also to market share gain. Another area where we see technology helping a lot is serving our customer better. We are very excited about the launch of our new digital connection program. As Betty mentioned, this will allow us to understand millions of customers in each of the interactions they do in our ecosystem. But it's not only that. Most importantly, it's to interconnect the services and offerings we have for Andrea easily. In the video behind me, you can see how AI is empowering our ecosystem, allowing Andrea to easily move between our different verticals.
This is something on which we're working on and will be deployed later this year. All in all, we want to get to know each one of our Andreas better in order to serve them better in a more personalized way. Finally, our technology not only allows us to understand our customer better, serve them better, but also to engage better with them.
That's why Mamá Lucha, Bodega Aurrerá , beloved brand icon, I am sure all of you know her, is a Mexican heroine of savings, and we are transforming her into a digital influencer. Mamá Lucha will become even more present in the life of Mexicans with saving tips on their daily lives, improving their family's quality of life. Empowered by technology, Mamá Lucha will further embody the promise Andrea asked us to deliver on: "Please, I need product and services at the lowest price I can afford.
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Thank you, Tomás. Gastón, so Tomás shared a bit about how technology is fostering our level of customer centricity. How are we using technology within supply chain to create a differentiated and competitive advantage for Walmart?
Thank you, Brian. Good afternoon, everyone. Certainly, we see that technology is also powering our supply chain as a competitive advantage. We are progressing fast in combining our extended and very urban, more than 3,000 stores network with our first, middle, and last-mile infrastructure. This journey will enable an integrated distribution network powered with strong data and algorithm capabilities. Let me give you just two practical examples around this journey. In the first case, we are enabling state-of-the-art automation in our distribution network. To that end, we have signed a memorandum of understanding with Symbotic that leverages the very same tech solution implemented by our DCs in Walmart U.S.
As you can see in the video, this tech and AI solution not only fully automates our DC operation, it actually provides the unique capability to deliver pallets to stores organized by aisle and by category, enabling productivity to the next level at our store's backrooms while also improving customer in-stocks. In the end, these productivity gains in the business backend will free more than 1,000 associates to serve better our customers in the front end, in the certain areas, and ultimately to improve our sales conversion. Smarter, not harder, way of working towards reinforcing our win in discount strategy priority going forward. We will start this deployment in the buildup of our new DC Bajío, our biggest one in the supply chain network that we expect to open in 2027.
Additionally, we are working to further deploy these types of technologies across the entire network in the years to come. We will actually be the first movers with this type of solution in all the Latin American retail industry. Let me give you a second example. In this case, we are also leveraging on corporate solutions also already implemented in Walmart U.S. Among those two, one is a new warehouse management system, Atlas. Another one is a new omni-routing platform, both solutions being implemented in Mexico as we speak. In the first case, the Atlas platform enables our brick-and-mortar DCs to also dispatch items to the end customers, acting as both a traditional DC but also an extended assortment fulfillment center.
We already enabled five DCs in Mexico, and we are progressing on the entire network in the next months to drastically reduce our delivery times all across the country, but specifically or especially in the inner regions far away from our fulfillment centers in Mexico, Guadalajara, and Monterrey Cities. In the second case, the new omni-routing platform will enable the merge and integration of the different fleets being used as stores, DCs, and fulfillment centers to consolidate our volumes in the last mile. This volume consolidation within a single One Transportation platform will enable the optimization of the existing more than 4,000 vehicles that we use in last mile.
This, in turn, will optimize the entire fleet utilization with an expected 20% reduction in our lead times for e-commerce omni-routes deliveries, paired with a 10% reduction in our cost per shipment. Again, smarter, not harder, way of working towards superior customer service and business strategy reinforcement.
Thank you, Gastón. Alejandra, while tech and AI continue to accelerate our journey, however, as our founder highlighted, it's our people that make the difference. Can you take us through what we are doing to improve our associate paradigm and what that means for the value creation journey?
Thank you, Brian. Good afternoon, everyone. As we presented today, we're a people-led, tech-powered company. But what does it mean? As a company, we chose a path where benefits of technology are practiced, but people are considered all along the way, a path that uses technology to serve people and not the other way around. What you saw today in our stores is a story about our people for embracing change in the service for Andrea. We want our people to enjoy their jobs and for them to know that they belong at Walmart. Our associates will be leveraging technology, but most importantly, we'll continue to build on our values and humanity. Let me give you three examples of the things we're doing in people. We continue investing in our people's compensation, learning, and well-being to improve our associate value proposition.
First, we're driving competitive advantage wages to attract and retain best talent. Second, in learning, we just launched last year a new set of actions to improve their development. Among them, through Walmart, we granted 2,500 scholarships for our associates to obtain their high school and university degree online, and we expect to continue to support this program. We're upskilling and reskilling our capabilities across the company. Third, to support our associates in their well-being, we also offer a free digital membership called MAS that allows our people and their families to have access to physical, emotional, financial, and family health. All these initiatives have had a very good impact in our attrition that went from 65% in 2019 to 38% in 2023, and also in our engagement index of 90%, improving four points versus 2022, reaching our all-time mark, as it was mentioned this morning.
To make our associates' lives smarter, not harder, I'm going to give you three examples of how technology is helping our people. First, in training, 85% of all the courses that we give to our associates are delivered digitally. Second, something very exciting for us is, by leveraging our global solutions, we will accelerate the digital journey for our own associates with an app called Me@Walmart that has been built in the U.S. These solutions combine 300 systems into one single user experience. We are launching Me@Walmart and will be implemented in 2024. And third, you're going to be seeing this in the video, we just launched last week for our home office associates, My Assistant. There is a feature powered by GenAI with similar functionalities as ChatGPT. My Assistant can translate languages, create content, and answer questions in an informative way.
My Assistant is helping our associates do their jobs smarter, faster, and easier. These platforms will help our people spend more time with our customers, improve their way of working, solve problems faster, and communicate better. We will continue creating technology that serves our people and not the other way around, investing in improving how we work and how effectively we can serve our customers and associates. Walmart is indeed a tech-powered company, but it is our people who always make the difference.
Thank you, Ale. Thank you, Gastón. Thank you, Tomás. These four enablers allow us to maximize our people engagement, the quality of life, and our decision-making processes. Using and developing technology will continue to be a key and an unlock for our success now and in the future, ensuring that we continue to support our associates and that we continue to make world-class experiences for our customers within our digital experience, across our ecosystem, and in our stores. Now, we leave you with Cristina, who will show you how our business in Central America is evolving. Thank you.
Good afternoon, everyone. I am Cristina Ronski, and I am the new CEO for Walmart Central America. Five years ago, I joined Walmart Central America as the Chief Merchandising Officer and also as a board member for Walmart Chile. Now, after two years of leading health and wellness in Mexico, I am returning to the Central America region to ignite growth, building from its foundation. When you think about Central America, what do you think about? You probably think about rich cultural heritage. You probably think about diverse ecosystems, ancient ruins, perhaps complex political environments. When we think about Central America, we think about opportunities. We think about the opportunity to bring our low prices to more communities. We think about the opportunities to go beyond product, to services, to solutions.
We think about the opportunities of improving the lives of millions of families in the countries that we operate. Today, you are going to hear about Central America's transformation. You are going to hear about our future opportunities. You are going to hear about the bold actions we are going to take to accelerate growth. In 2020, we started the transformation to prepare the organization for acceleration. We focused on having solid stores. We focused on the core. We focused on building a stronger financial performance. We were determined to create the capacity for omnichannel acceleration and for launching our ecosystem efforts. What are some of the initiatives that we implemented through this transformation to prepare the region for acceleration? One of our initiatives was to create a more customer-centric culture to better understand our customer needs.
We achieved an NPS increase of 300 basis points versus 2020. We reinforced our customer value proposition with our everyday low prices. We increased private label penetration in our discount format, increasing 470 basis points and reaching 21.6% penetration. Another initiative was to reinforce our low-cost culture. We improved our SG&A by 100 basis points. We improved our supply chain efficiencies and built a leaner structure. This, in turn, supported our CVP investments and increased our profitability, creating this positive momentum. We achieved a sustainable annual growth rate of 10% in sales and 14% in profit. We accelerated close to 1.5 x versus the prior five years. Beyond the financial achievements, we also made significant progress on our regenerative agenda versus 2020. So what are some of these initiatives? We focused on our associate value proposition. We increased our engagement rate 600 basis points, reaching 93%.
We advanced our diversity and inclusion initiatives. We now have over 1,800 associates with disabilities. This is an increase from 3%-5% of our workforce. We increased our female representation, going from 44%-49%, which is close to parity. We grew our purchases from small suppliers by 39%. And we increased the use of our renewable energy by 700 basis points. Due to all of these initiatives and many more, I am proud that Walmart Central America was recognized as the most trusted company, as well as the company with the best corporate reputation in the region. We built the foundation we needed to accelerate growth, to unleash the opportunities. So what are some of those opportunities we have in Central America to accelerate growth? Let's start with our Central America customer.
Our Central America Andrea has a budget between $1-$2 per person in her family for food and consumables per day. We see an opportunity to further enhance our everyday low prices offer and at the prices that she can afford. We know how important price is for her. Andrea walks several kilometers to shop at many different stores, looking for the best deals. We want to provide her with a one-stop shopping experience. We want to save her time and money. Another opportunity we see is remittances. Remittances are one of Andrea's most important sources of income. She uses remittances for basic purchases. There are $40 billion of remittances that come into the region every year. In four out of the five countries where we operate, remittances contribute more than 20% to their gross domestic product.
We can now offer Andrea a seamless remittances collection at all our points of sale. Another opportunity is to support Andrea with her big purchases. Andrea does look for a refrigerator stove for her home. But with her income, she cannot pay for it at once. She needs to be able to have an opportunity to pay on an installment and on a monthly basis. So we have an opportunity to offer her not only the lowest price, but a feasible option that fits her monthly budget and access to interest-free installments. In Central America, they use more than $1 billion per year for credits. In addition, we can deliver this refrigerator, stove, and any other products to Andrea to her home. This way, we can save her on the cost of transportation. We can save her time, and we can save her money.
So what are the bold actions we will take moving forward to go faster and to accelerate? Our strategy is aligned with Mexico's growth formula. But we are sequencing the execution based on the opportunities that we have in Central America. We believe that by leveraging Mexico's learnings, we can go faster. And we are determined to take those bold actions moving forward. One of the bold actions is to more than double the number of store openings per year in the next five years. We plan to open 200 new stores in the region. We know that with more stores, our customers can be closer to our low prices. Another bold action is to invest in supply chain expansion and automation to support the growth strategy that we are looking for.
We will increase our investments 30% more in CapEx in supply chain in the following five years compared to 2023 as a percent of sales. Most of these investments will be allocated to our new distribution centers, to expansion, and to automation. Another bold action is to accelerate our private brands, especially in our discount format, to 26%. We will further leverage our global sourcing to offer quality products at prices that our customers can afford. Another bold action is to grow omnichannel approximately 7 x faster than our physical stores. We are leveraging Mexico's and global technology developments to improve our customer shopping experience. To date, we have been able to reach a sales penetration of 3.4% in our Walmart format in just three years. Another one of our bold actions moving forward is to expand our omnichannel to our Bodegas in the region.
This will help Andrea save on transportation, on time, and on money. Our goal is also to become the ecosystem of choice. Last year, we launched Walmart Connect, leveraging Mexico capabilities, expertise to bring our products to our over 1 million customers that shop in our stores every day. Going forward, we expect that Walmart Connect will enhance the shopping experience by connecting our customers closer to the benefits of our advertisers' products. We expect Walmart Connect to become a substantial source of revenue that we can, in turn, reinvest in our customer value proposition and in our other growth initiatives. Another bold action we will take to serve our customers better is to bring a collection of remittances to our checkouts, such as Mexico did. We want to be the best option for remittances, connecting our Walmart to Walmart infrastructure to make Andrea's budget go even farther.
We want to give Andrea a secure, easier way to receive her money in our stores, where she can, in turn, make her purchases. We are excited about the future of our ecosystem because, as Mexico implements new services, Central America can leverage the learnings and technology to expedite the deployment locally. In conclusion, we see big opportunities, and we are taking bold actions. I am convinced that Walmart Central America will accelerate and continue to be a source of sustainable, profitable growth. I am even more convinced that we have so many opportunities to realize our purpose. We are committed to improving the lives of Central America families. We want to give them better lives today and a better future tomorrow. Thank you very much. I will leave you with Paulo, who's going to talk to us about value creation.
Good afternoon, everyone. I hope you can still handle probably another 10 minutes or so and probably what is staying between the small break and then the live Q&A. Let me start. It's a pleasure, once again, having you guys and hoping you are enjoying the Walmex Day that we prepared for you. You had the opportunity to visit our stores today. I think you had the opportunity to experience our strategy materializes on the sales floor. Today, I am pleased to share with you the results of our growth formula that we've been talking about. Our growth formula is driving value creation. Last year, I shared with you our long-term vision and our commitment to sustainable value creation. Today, I am telling you that we've continued on the same path. We remained committed with the goals we set.
We continue to prioritize long-term value creation while addressing the short term. We are confident our business delivers sustainable profit growth. In our effort to double the business in less than 10 years, as Gui has mentioned, we have maintained our investment in high-return projects. We have continued, as you can see, to expand return on invested capital in 2023. So you can ask, so what are the results that show that our growth strategy is working? And I know that my colleagues have already shown a lot of results. Let me highlight some of them. One of the results is growth. In 2023, we achieved an increase on our total revenues of 9.3% excluding exchange rate effects, which was driven by both growth in Mexico and in Central America of 9.3% and 9.4%, respectively. Another result, and an important one, is the quality of our strategic investments.
In 2023, we accelerated CapEx deployment, as you know, further expanding our reach, remodeling our stores, and increasing technology investments and the level of automation in our ecosystem. Another result is returns. Our gross investments increased our best-in-class return on invested capital by over 40 basis points in line with the commitment we made to you a year ago, with the commitment to maintain our financial discipline and to create value during an investment phase. These are the key results. It's important to say we have achieved these results by growing same-store sales ahead of the market, as you've heard before, and by achieving exponential growth in the new businesses. Although there is volatility between the quarters, we managed to meet our goals. We demonstrated the solidity and resilience of our business and of our growth formula.
The new verticals, such as Bait, Financial Solutions, Health, and Connect, are having a positive impact on our core business in very significant ways, as you heard today. But you can ask, so Paulo, what are the examples that indicate how is our ecosystem strengthening the core of our business? One example is e-commerce. In on-demand, the ticket size is between 2x-3 x larger than a regular brick-and-mortar customer. In some cases, such as an extended catalog of Bodega, it can be up to 10 x larger. Another example is connectivity and health. You heard it already. Bait is attracting more traffic to our digital channels and platforms. The pilot test of the digital connection program indicates that the monthly frequency of Bait users is more than 20% higher than the non-Bait users.
In our health vertical, as mentioned by Betty, you also heard it in the store, at this early stage, we have observed that the customers with health memberships, pharmacy tickets that are higher, are about 4x larger than those of a customer without it. Another example is financial solutions, which are also generating traffic and purchases that otherwise will not occur. As mentioned during the store visit, we estimate that out of our remittances collected with us, around 50% is spent at the store. We've also seen that there is an up to 20% sales uplift when our customers pay with Cashi. So each of these new verticals is driving growth and strengthening our core business. I have mentioned in the past years, but I really want to say it again. The whole is really greater than the sum of the parts.
And all of this is possible thanks to our growth formula. So probably what you're expecting comes now. So what are the investments we need to make to further strengthen our growth formula and our ecosystem? In 2024, we plan to invest MXN 34.5 billion in Mexico and Central America, of which we will allocate 45% of this investment to renovating our current stores and incorporating new functions to provide the best shopping experience for our customers and continue to align with our goal of being a regenerative company by 2040. 29% will go to the opening of new stores to further expand our reach to more customers. Bodega will continue to be a main vehicle to achieve it. New stores will contribute between 1.4%-1.6% to the total growth of our consolidated sales in 2024. 15% will be allocated to supply chain.
As you heard earlier from Gastón, our distribution centers are evolving towards an omnichannel approach and with the present levels of technology and automation in the country. Lastly, 11% of our CapEx will be allocated to technology. As you heard from Brian, we are making investments that not only improve our current capabilities but, more importantly, pave the way for the future. With technology as a key enabler, we are prepared to transform and improve the lives of our communities. Important to mention, our above-mentioned technology CapEx spend represents only about one-third - I repeat, 1/3 - of our technology total spend if we contemplate also local and global OpEx investments. This illustrates how much we are investing in technology to unlock the growth potential of our business.
As in the past, as you can expect from us, these investments will be made with the financial discipline that characterizes us and will be reflected in the returns on investments that should be seen. So what are our goals for the future? As Gui mentioned, we will accelerate growth, doubling the business faster than before. Within growth, and it's an important number here as well, we are committed to extend our reach, opening more than 1,000 stores in Mexico and Central America in the next five years, since stores, as you heard from Ignacio, are the cornerstone of the ecosystem. Through this formula, we will accelerate value creation, committing, once again, to increase returns on invested capital over this next 10-year period. To fuel this value creation, we will rely on the development of e-commerce in the new vertical's proposition.
Both together - that's the number you're seeing there - should account for up to 35% of the incremental profit that we'll generate in the next five years. I think there is potential for more, we think. We believe our growth formula will continue to accelerate value creation. Every innovation we introduce, every step we take forward, is just another link in the chain that connects us with our customers. Whether it is through Bait providing connectivity, Cashi facilitating digital transactions, or through our stores, which are really the most important point, offering access to a wide range of products, we are committed to meeting our customers' needs and making their lives better. As I'm about to wrap up this event - yes, I am - I would like to leave you with three main financial takeaways.
One, our growth formula is working, allowing us to double the business faster. Two, we are creating an ecosystem where the whole is bigger than the sum of the parts. Three, driving value creation with best-in-class returns on invested capital. Lastly, what I want you to know is that when you invest in Walmex, you are investing in a growth company with best-in-class returns. You are investing in a company that pays a consistent dividend to shareholders with the average dividend yield. Three, you are investing in a e-commerce company and omnichannel market leader. You are investing in one of the largest and fastest-growing players in telecommunications. You are investing in a top-five player in advertising. Yes, as you heard it today, you are investing in a future top player in primary healthcare and digital education.
You are investing in a company that is not afraid to challenge the boundaries of innovation. But fundamentally, you are investing in the future of Mexico and Central America. Thank you very much for your interest today. Now, let's do a short break, and we'll return for the short Q&A. Thank you very much.
Just coming back on, obviously, bringing it all together and the investment plan. And one of the things that stuck to me was the 45%, almost half, of CapEx going into remodeling. Help us understand, maybe frame, what are the focus areas of these investments into remodeling as it relates to the strategy to also grow with the new businesses? How much do you need to invest in remodeling to enable all the new strategies we've learned about today? Thank you.
Yeah. Thanks, Ben. I think a good part of that investment is just business as usual, that you have the stores that you will have to maintain over a certain period. You can enter into discussion whether it's out of cycle or not off- cycle, but it's what we have to put the stores up to scratch. And then, of course, there's also a good chunk that's about investments that we are making. What we're talking about, we want to improve more on around some of the fresh experience in the stores, but also in some of the stores enabling for what we talked about, the verticals.
But the bulk, if you wanted to stay on one message, Ben, will be about actually just maintaining our stores and renew it and update it to the new prototypes and what we define it going forward, they will look like, as well as, sorry, the regenerative component, which comes along.
We have a chart. Unfortunately, we didn't show it today, but we showed it previously to you guys that showed that our growth till 2013, I think, was mainly achieved through new stores. Those stores are now coming to the limit of the remodeling cycle that we use. So the numbers in the couple of years are going to represent that need that we have from time to time to renew stores. So there are more stores. Then they will incorporate there will be regular numbers. Also, yeah, changing a little bit this, we used to have from time to time full remodels. Given the dynamics of the market today and what's happening about Omni, we're probably going to do bigger interventions but not full remodels more frequently. So you get, for a couple of years, the combination of those two things.
We need to do full remodels for the stores that are completing seven, eight, 10 years, and you see the change of what we are doing. I do believe that changing it to doing big interventions for adapting our stores is going to mean that we are going to have the whole fleet adapted much faster for the Omni business and the new verticals than waiting for the cycle to remodel it. That's the main reason.
Hi. Thanks, It's Paulo. The first one would be for Gui. In the last conference call, you mentioned that you figured out a way of how to accelerate store openings of Bodega Aurrerá , if I'm not mistaken. Just curious if you can guide us here on why not to expect more openings in 2024 just on Bodega Aurrerá , and what could you or what will you be doing different in order to accelerate growth here? And then the other one is for Paulo.
Yeah. You will see. You will see more growth in Bodega Aurrerá , especially Express. We have prepared ourselves. So used to take us three years to open a Bodega Aurrerá Express. It's taking now seven months. We had to make small changes on the things we do because it requires licenses. So we changed it the way we do. We changed the type of products we offer. But we will offer fresh, which sometimes others don't. So we will do it. We will also experiment different sizes if needed. So you're going to have a growth number. It wasn't our plan before. We also need to coordinate it with the change we are doing in supply chain. Our supply chain was built for big stores, and we've been more and more adapting it to the new fleet we have.
There is a synchronized way that we will ensure that we will have the right cost to do that. I think now we are ready to go for bigger numbers in Bodega Express, and we will. You are going to see. Last year, you saw a little bit. You're going to see more this year.
That's nice. And the other one for Paulo, if you can comment on the comment of the 35%?
Yeah. You get away with this one, but let's make sure everyone asks so that I get yeah. Yeah. You get away with this one.
Okay. Comment on the 35% incremental profit. Unless I got it wrong, I mean, it's like a 6% or so CAGR on EBIT, right? So just curious, I mean, why this 6% are not higher? Are you assuming kind of some contraction on the margin side? Maybe you can clarify on that.
I didn't give you anything on EBIT growth, Rodrigo. All I'm saying is that the profit incremental that we think we will see in the next five years, we are expecting to see that of that incremental profit that's growing the next five years, a good chunk of that - and I said 35% - will come from the new verticals and e-commerce. So all the point was there, just showing that they are contributing more to the core business. So I've not given any data on EBIT today. It's now Bob, Renata, Álvaro, and then Irma. Okay?
Thank you very much. It's Bob Ford from Bank of America Merrill Lynch. How should we think about the evolution in the past to incremental profitability for both Bait and Health in terms of maybe some more specific benchmarks in the user base or monetization opportunities or scale thresholds?
I'll do take that. I made the point too, but I'll take that. First of all, we do various benchmarks. So one of the things that we have learned is that if you are going to do this type of business, you'd better put focus on growth then first before you monetize them. Remember, we have changed our board members. We have brought to our board people that have the capabilities that we need for what we're trying to do in the future with our business. Among those board members, we brought Eric. He was MercadoLibre, and now he runs his own fund of management. And we brought the person in charge of strategy for our PhonePe business in India. The strong recommendation is that focus on growing the number of users, and then you start to monetize. Would love to do both at the same time.
Formally, we need to focus a little bit. Our main focus is to grow. Once you grow, monetizing options are multiple. If you look at the P&L of Bait and you compare that with P&L of phone companies, they're very different because they're already monetizing it. We're agency. We know their things. Beatriz has worked 20+ years in the phone market, so she knows exactly what can be done to monetize. It's about the time to start to think about it, but we still have a huge growth plan for this year. I think, my personal opinion, I take the risk that if we achieve our plans and we will achieve, we'll be able to, next year, start to think more seriously about monetizing Bait. However, we're also learning about how to look at the P&L. I have a finance background. Paulo has a finance background.
We came from the same school. It's difficult for us to adapt because once in pharmacy, once somebody had this great idea of giving 5% discount for somebody to acquire a membership that costs MXN 30, I think my first reaction is that, "Tell me who that person is. I'm going to fire them." I couldn't find the reason. Until I get to realize some months later that the average ticket of that person grows 4x , that 1 million people have attended our offices, our doctor offices that had low attendance before because it comes free. So if I do the P&L of the office, it's a disaster, the doctor office. If I do the P&L of the membership and I include the 5% discount in that P&L, it is a disaster. So we are learning how to measure those things.
But more than that, we are learning how to measure the whole consequence of everything we are doing. So we have initiatives to monetize this digital connection program that we are going to launch in quarter two. They're going to give us the data. But more than data, we need the goodwill of guys like me to learn because if I get it the way I used to get it, I'm going to kill many business opportunities and many monetization opportunities before they start to give us. What I can tell you is that based on what I saw, it is good. It's very good. But we will need to learn together first how to measure it. The whole system's going to grow faster. So one of the things I'm telling Paulo is that and they're going to hate me for that. We are going to grow faster.
But maybe the first few years, profit's not going to grow as fast. They say, "But we are happy with us doubling the business and growing profits a little bit higher." So let's imagine doubling the business in 10 years, 7.2% growth, mathematical. And you're happy. Your 10 years, good. Grow profit, 8%. But now, if I grow sales at 10% and profit at 8%, you say, "Reduce the prices. Sell it." But that 10% growth, and maybe that's a slightly declining profit percentage, in a few years' time, when we learn how to monetize that extra growth, wait and see. Wait and see. That's why I hate when Paulo talks about percentage margin. It's not good. That's my last desperate try to convince him. I'm going to do that public. But we will need, and you will need to see our business differently.
Unfortunately, my growth formula doesn't tell me what's the way, what's the formula for us to see it. So what we did today is to try to give you more data. So we'll learn together. We'll learn together. But it's good.
Thank you very much. Thank you.
Renata.
Hi. Thanks so much.
I can answer in Portuguese now, at least.
Could be. Could be. So thanks for taking my question. It is about the financial solutions. You have presented a series of initiatives that can be transformational for this business line. So my question is, can you share your learnings, especially after the Trafalgar acquisition in 2023, and if that helped to accelerate the plans? And the second point is, can we have some idea of the timeframe that this change will happen and when the consumer will have one-stop shop in terms of financial solution for the Walmex? Thank you.
Let me help you. Let me share the learnings before Trafalgar, before you have. When we had the idea of Wallet, it came together with the idea of Bait. Our customer had a couple of main pain points. One, that they didn't have internet. Second, is that they didn't have a payment method. And that was not allowing them to buy in the internet. So we had this great idea of doing Wallet. An open wallet was a bad word in Walmart at that time. So we got the rights to launch a closed wallet, and we didn't have a bank license. Walmart completely changed its view after the acquisition of PhonePe in India. It's a great business. If you haven't taken a look on this, take a look on this. And then we're pushing open wallet. I think the biggest mistake we had was to overpromise.
We thought that giving our reach, etc., we could do great even with closed wallet. It's impossible because our customers, they will never lock their money in a closed wallet because they don't have enough. So we were too optimistic, and we sold to you the optimism. We learned. Do I regret having launched a closed wallet? No. Because a lot of the learning curve we are going to have, we're going to have now with open wallet, we had already with closed wallets. So I expect these men now to do a very fast and good job. But we had lots of learnings. And then it comes Trafalgar and the difficulties, but he knows better than me, so I'm going to pass the baton to you.
Thank you for the questions. Now, we are doing two things. We are transforming the closed-loop wallet to the open-loop wallet with all the features I told you today. We are doing all the compliance stuff and paperwork to being able to launch this. Having said that, we're going to launch in a few months. We are near. Everything that I showed you today, it's already working. We have 40 accounts that were opened through the process that you've seen in the video. We have done purchases at stores in Mexico and other countries. We made withdrawals at ATMs in Mexico and in other countries. We make transfers to and from any bank to Cashi, from Cashi to other banks. We receive remittances digitally already in these Cashi accounts. So we have already tested most of the things that you've seen.
We expect to launch in a few months with everything or most of the things that you've seen. We are just in the end of the road, making those adjustments to be able to launch it soon to all of the customers. Most of you received also the mock of the card. I promise that next time, I'm going to give you one with some funds so that you can also try it. Those are just mocks. They are not going to work. But we already have 40 cards working, and everything is being tested, and it's working well.
Álvaro. Then it will be him after that.
Thank you for the space for questions. My questions for Dolores is actually on private label penetration. I think you mentioned that you plan to double private label penetration. You didn't sort of quantify the timeframe. So maybe if you can give some color on that. But my bigger question is how you're balancing sort of national brands versus your private label growth on the shelf, right? That's a big battle to have and whether you're seeing some consequences as a result. Thank you.
Yeah. Actually, I talked about this during lunch with a couple of you. What we see is that we want to offer each customer what they want. What we offer in Walmart is a portfolio of brands. So we know that the value proposition for the customer is not just private brands, and it's not just commercial brands. So for each manner, we have a different value proposition and a different mix in private brands. One of the things I've been asked is, "How much time do you want?
How many years do you think you're going to double the penetration?" My answer was, "If I tell you two years, you're going to keep asking me, 'Two years, what did it happen?' If I tell you three, it's that." The thing that we have today, and I think we've already been working in the past three years in the quality of our brands, in the reputation of our brands, and all the data points that I share with you today shows that the customer really trusts our private brands. That's why we think we can accelerate that. Now, we have the basics of the quality. We have the specs. We have the innovation. With what we've done, we know that now we can innovate. We don't need to follow the leaders. I told you during the visit, in some categories, our brand is the number one brand.
We are competing or giving that value to our customers with our brands and with the rest of the brands. Do I see any risk with the rest of the brands or the suppliers? No. We've been partnering with them. We want to grow the business as a whole. That means we can grow the business with them, and at the same time, we can further increase the business with our private brands. That's the way we see it. We really trust the pace at which we are growing our private brands.
Thanks, Dolo and Álvaro. Irma.
So mathematically, if we grow Bodega faster, the private brands percentage of sales is going to be faster, just making her life a little bit easier. But she has to do better than that.
Irma, over to you.
Yeah. Great. Thanks. Irma Sgarz from Goldman Sachs. Just going back to your CapEx plan, Paulo, when we think of CapEx, not in terms of absolute number because that's obviously, hopefully, going to continue to rise, but when we think as a percentage of sales, should we think of 2024 sort of roughly as sort of the peak, or is it sort of coming down from here? Is it the new plateau?
I think in the next couple of years in the past, I think a year ago, we've talked about the next two to three years. Today, you've heard Gastón talk about a big investment we make in one of big DCs, the full automation. And it is here that we have planned an investment early on, actually, when I joined the company two years ago. And then because now, of course, the levels of the labor costs in this market, these types of investments start to justify. So I think you will see these levels of investment CapEx as a percentage of sale to be around in the next three to four years, hovering around the levels that we probably see in this year. But I think our commitment, which is important, and I said it today. I said it in past as well, is accelerate growth.
As Gui already was making the point illustrative when he said absolute returns, but also keep on delivering on return on invested capital. Keep on delivering on returns. And it's our job to manage that. It's also manage the capital. It's also manage working capital. And I think there's potential there as well.
Yeah. That would have been my following question. Then where do you specifically see the opportunities in working capital? Is it more inventory data?
Inventory. Inventory.
Let me tell you. Last year, we said two to three years of CapEx. Everybody has a reference of about 3 percentage points. Last year, we said 3.2-4 for a couple of years or three years. This year, we are saying five. I hope next year, I tell you, 10. And we are working hard to find more opportunities to invest at the return rates we have. So we have two options here. Take this as bad news that CapEx level is going to be higher. Take this as the best thing you get from this day. That a company that produces best-in-class ROIC decided that they find a way to invest more. And we also have promised you we are going to increase our ROIC.
Thank you.
Yes. Hi. Thank you for taking my question. Daniela from HSBC. So on digital, the penetration of e-commerce in Walmex is 6.8% of sales, and in Central America, it's half of that. But I was just curious as to why don't you have an ambitious target for e-commerce? Rather, you want to grow those other businesses. Is it because of the profitability of e-commerce compared to this other business? And then in terms of sales driver, that can be as good as? So if you could help us understand why not, "Oh, I'm going to accelerate in e-commerce because you do have a very big white space there.
Yeah. So let me start with the ambitions. We do have it. It's a very big one. We discuss it frequently with Gui. But then it's a matter of priorities, investments, and doing it the right way. I come from a background of building sustainable business and not creating crazy, unsustainable business just to show big growth or big numbers very fast. And we saw that with I remember a few questions a few years back about ultrafast last milers and why they were growing so much and we were not growing that fast. And the reality now is none of them exist, and we are still here. So believe us, we are doing the right step to create a profitable and sustainable business for the long run. We need to accelerate. I agree on that. There's a lot of things we need to still do and keep accelerating.
But I believe that all the digital transformation we are doing and all the leverage with technology with the U.S., with a Walmart Commerce Platform, will start paying a lot of giving us a lot of growth going forward. And together with a commercial team as well, thinking differently, using technology, and using data to create a better assortment and better offer to the customers will help us accelerate. And then we have our core that is groceries. Remember, we are market leaders there, and that part is profitable. We need to keep on working on the rest of the business.
Let me help a little bit. More historical view. Big animals may start slow, but once they reach some speed, watch. Some years ago, when Nacho joined it, we didn't have the knowledge. So I had a huge willingness to grow e-commerce, and I was totally ignorant. And we were playing in 1P and a little bit on Marketplace, losing a lot of money. And your questions here were a little bit different. Well, how much money you're going to lose, how much time you're going to waste, why don't you leave it to the experts? The investors were saying, "Let me invest in the new digital companies, and you do your job on stores." And we were telling you, "We'll learn. Be patient. Trust us. And an omni company is more profitable than a brick-and-mortar company or a digital-only company." We bet on it. And we changed our strategy.
When Nacho arrived with his knowledge, we came to the conclusion we are trying to play on somebody else's stadium, their type of game. And we said, "Then we have our biggest asset were our stores. Our big competitive asset were our stores." So we said, "We have a competitive advantage in our stores, and we have a business that at that time was starting to be attacked by the last milers," which don't forget was a big threat. They were arriving. They were doing only a small piece of the job, getting all the information, and maybe they would become profitable by getting that information and monetizing it. That was the threat. So we decided to put our focus on growing where we had the competitive advantage and on defending our business for that threat. And we succeeded. And you see what's happening with the last milers.
We built last-mile capability superior to what some people that we even thought about acquiring then had. Look at where they are now. Look where the big animal is today. We had another huge problem. As you saw, we have a big benefit because we benefit from U.S. tech development. We also have a big problem when they are in trouble. So they were focusing on themselves to develop the right tech to fight the battle that they were also behind. So we didn't get the attention that we needed to develop the tech to compete in Marketplace or to compete. But we did not even easy to blame them and to say, "They didn't give me the tech. But I didn't have the talent. Now I have because it's different if I try to hire the talent or he does it. He will hire the right people.
“I will hire the wrong people.” So we hired an excellent team for e-commerce. So we built the talent. We built the capabilities. Now we have a good portion of tech that allow us to gain what, 6 million-8 million of new SKUs last year? 90 million of new SKUs last year. And I think you promised 10 more million this year. And in two years' time, we will be part of the U.S. So wait for the elephant. We're coming. We're coming. Look at what happened in the U.S. when the elephant started to accelerate. Who from here, including no, I can't say that, would bet Walmart would be in the position we are today in the U.S.? The learning is not going to stay there. Wait and see.
Thank you.
Gui, if you allow me, I just wanted to clarify one. The 3.2%, because we are started in Central America, it is our Walmart format. And that is why the huge potential we have when we talk about expanding on demand and expanding to Bodegas. So that is for one format, even though we have the.
To be fair with you, you wanted to show much faster than Mexico achieved it. We cut it. But now you have the opportunity to say it.
Can I say just two quick things? I want to use the opportunity to say one thing, and then we got two questions. I'm pretty sure your question comes because you didn't see out there us committing long-term going forward what we're going to do there, where you saw today a lot of numbers that we committed. One, I hope that's appreciated by all of you. And the e-commerce one, we've not committed because we probably made that mistake in the past, and there are things that we cannot control. So I think just to clarify that and that you appreciate there are a lot more numbers out there. No, actually, it was Felipe, Andrew, and then you, Federico, at least once I've seen it. No, sorry. You were first, and then you, Federico.
Hi. Felipe Cassimiro from Bradesco. I apologize if I don't recall exactly the name of the initiative, but I wanted to explore the pilot to collect data from consumers, the cell phone numbers.
Digital connectivity program.
I'm curious how this could be a game-changer for you to be more assertive in the new businesses.
So imagine the following. I have by far the best aggregate data in Mexico and Central America. We know, Andrea, we didn't know that well because we had not invested in data and in insights. Then we did a huge transformation of the business. Now I can say, "We know Andrea. We know Lucy. We know Carlos very, very, very well." But if I want to talk to her, I need to use traditional methods of talking to her. And she wants to talk to me. She cannot do massively. So we have created the capacity to massively talk to her and to massively listen to her. Tomás mentioned it. So today, using artificial intelligence, using all the technology we have developed, I can talk to them, and we can help to understand her needs and solve them fast. But also, we need more granular data.
Somebody asked me, "If Andrea buys Bait, we have pieces of information that shows us there are a lot of synergies among the various verticals." I can prove in those three states because I cannot prove it in the rest of the country. We will be able to manage our relationship with Andrea and then to take the right action and measure the consequences through the digital program because she gives us her telephone number, and we register every transaction she does with us from store to Bait, etc. By the way, we will create over time the best credit rating in Mexico for our kind of customers with that information. There are some consequences of that. We will know. We have prepared the company that once we know, we can take action fast. We're ready to take action.
So our information will not be business by business at least as good with the digital players in those businesses, but we will have the view of Andrea in the various businesses. So if you tell me what's the great announcement this year, for me, it's this. For me, it's this. And we've been fighting for the last two years to build the right thing. We could have done some years ago, for example, by offering, "Join us, and I give you 2% discount." Now, my bill before any benefit would start with MXN 800 million. Who would've said no?
So we managed to build something that half of that adult population joined in six months without giving those 2%, without treating those customers that joined different from the ones that not joined because Sam Walton told us that if I accept it and I give different prices, over time, to maintain my margin, I have to increase the overall margin. So it's not smart for Everyday Low Price players. We will give them benefits that we measure, and they are good enough to incentive behavior without damaging our Everyday Low Price stores. So it took two years. That is good. I tell you, it is good.
I will add that the digital connection program will be the glue for the entire ecosystem. First, we are going to be having this knowledge of Andrea, and we will be able to serve her as she deserves. We are going to be able to really deliver value for Andrea as she expects. But the most important thing is, imagine the power of gathering data massively. We have the knowledge, and then convert this data into opportunities for Andrea and for Walmex. Let's talk about e-commerce, for example. Imagine the power of understanding why Andrea buys frequently one item. We can offer Andrea to send to her house in a subscription model. Imagine the power for Bait to convert this data massively to convert to be a Bait user because we have the best offer.
I think we are launching the program in the right moment because imagine the power of having the biggest audience to be contacted in Mexico with a deep knowledge of attribution. We are going to be having the power of telling the advertisers exactly what kind of products or what kind of products they can move their offer.
Tell me, which other company can advertise directly to customers and measure the result immediately with our reach? So I think Bait is being so shy about the numbers on Connect.
Thank you. That's why it's a very important announcement today.
Thank you. So we only have time for these three last questions. So it's Andrew, and it's you, and Federico. Sorry for that, guys. Yep.
Great. Thanks. Andrew Ruben with Morgan Stanley. So calling back to some of the comments on talent, I'm curious how personnel expense fits into your outlook. And that's both from the perspective of wage increases for store-level employees but also the go-forward need for incremental talent around tech, ads, logistics, just putting that all together. Thank you.
The two... very don't take note of that, please. Personnel expense that I try to avoid. When it's the wrong talent, maybe cheap but doesn't bring. So each of those people, plus the people that report to them, make a very good salary. I don't care. They produce a lot. The second thing is to I don't know how to say it in an elegant way, but to hire the wrong person with high initiative, that's the biggest disaster you can have. So that's one thing. Our top talents, they are here for two reasons. A lot of them, including myself, we don't make more money we used to make in our lives before joining Walmart. What convinced us to come here one by one was that with your talent, you can make a much bigger difference than what you can make because you can reach more people.
So we all got the right to get good money, and we do at Walmart. But what brought us here is not that. The difference is our purpose. We don't lose people. We don't lose senior people. All of us have been invited 200 x to leave. We don't because what we are going to do is different here than what we can achieve in other companies. Second thing is that for the biggest population, we need to pay better. We have a huge role on helping them to adapt to the change in their working life. They need to become digital. So we have heavily invested in the last few years, not yet where we want to be. So we will pay them better. We will recognize the contribution they do to our business better.
I cannot correct the past, but I will make sure we do the right future. We will generate enough business opportunities to pay for that. Be sure about that. But the numbers you got on engagement of 200—it's 230,000 people. 90-something% of them responded to the questionnaire. The engagement we get, the lower rotation, the e-satisfaction that we didn't show you pays back because they serve better the customer. So maybe the personal cost will continue to increase, maybe because the government is going to give, but if the government doesn't give, I'm going to give. We'll pay back. Okay?
Gui, can I just add one more? I think that let's not forget the positive kicker of the labor costs going up and people having more money in their pockets and then consumer spending increasing, which goes directly at the target that is served by our company. So that's always also a way of looking at it.
So sorry, I forgot your name.
Don't worry. Thank you very much. Héctor Maya , Scotiabank. So you've been building this ecosystem of new businesses over the past few years and e-commerce and new initiatives. So all of this has been building up this critical mass. And you've asked for patience. Now you're seeing you'll see, right? And for the size of this company to say that in the next five years, out of the incremental profit yields that you'll see, 35% of that will come from this ecosystem. My question there is, is there space for an additional new avenue to become part of your ecosystem that could even accelerate that number further? Or 35% in the next five years, is that the full picture, the full vision? Could we even see a higher number with what you are seeing now, your learnings?
The problem is that I don't know. I don't know. We try to put in our P&L everything we are doing. I confess, I don't know. I'm learning every month. We're getting better. So we know better on Bait. We know better on Connect. Ask me the health membership, I don't know the potential. Last year, my previous boss, Judith, she came back from a board meeting, and she said, "Congrats. They like it what they saw. But they're asking me one question I don't know how to answer." We said, "Tell me, Judith, what's the limit?" She said, "I don't know because every presentation I do, I come to the conclusion the limit is higher." I don't know. I know it's good. I have this feeling. I have the benefit that sometimes the CEO can take some batch that nobody believes. Do you know how we launched Bait?
Betty and I discussed it for months. Alberto, our lawyer, gave the idea. He found Betty who understood the business by having worked at them 20 years, but we didn't hire her because of telephone business, telecom. We talked for months, and I got very convinced. I didn't have the numbers. So I took courage. I think I never presented to my boss, by the way, but I thought it was too much to launch something without presenting to those guys, to the executive committee. So I decided Betty and I had already decided it. So let's socialize it to the executive committee. And we did. It was so absurd that they stayed quiet. And I learned that when you want something approved and everybody stay quiet, say, "Approved and move." So next day, somebody very important from my team came to me and said, "You are an idiot.
How can you approve in five minutes to enter into a new business that we know nothing about?" And I said, "Sorry, I didn't approve in five minutes. You did. I've been looking for that for a few months. You staying quiet, approved in five minutes. I don't want the numbers to be part of my P&L." I said, "Fine. I am the CEO. Certain things I'm allowed to do. But take a look on it." He came back a couple of days later and said, "You know what? Give it to me. I want those numbers." We don't know. I'll be lying to you. What I know is that with 5 million customers that they need desperate those benefits and the formula that we achieve that can deliver those benefits to them in a profitable way, this is big.
The problem is that I see this is big, and I try to sell health. I failed. Why? Because I know nothing about health. I learn. What I can say, if you look at the curves, you show the learning curve is shorter. The learning curve of health is shorter than Bait. The learning curve of education is going to be shorter than health. What's the limit? Don't know. I need to keep telling you, "Trust me." But I learned that trust is a question. You get trust when you are honest, reliable, and caring. I hope we have proven to you guys in the last few years that we are honest, we are reliable, and we care about people. That's why I have the courage to ask you, "Trust me." I hope it works, and it will.
Last question. Fede, you have the chance to end on a high, this event.
I will try.
Over to you.
You'll be remembered forever.
No, Walmart Express, you make some remarks in the first quarter conference calls. Your view for the year, if part of the remodeling CapEx is for the format, how do you see to improve the format? I expect it's high.
Yeah. I had promised. I almost made the joke. I had promised my wife to make these statements because she complains about it every day she goes to the market. So as I said to you, it happens. It's stupidity. It happens. I used to have a boss that said, "It's stupidity. It happens. Something that happens is potentially." You do one mistake. You want to prove you can fix. You do another mistake. The result is worse. Then you do another mistake. The result is worse. And you keep believing you're going to make it. So more than CapEx, it's more simple than CapEx. When a format totally fails, it's because it has the wrong customer value proposition. We took the assumption to assumptions that look logical. We cannot compete with the top premium stores. We're not that. We don't manage 20 stores. We manage much more.
Two-thirds of our stores, Superama stores, were located in B, C, D locations despite. Formerly, we got it wrong because recently, we found another way of measuring who shops with us. By using this new methodology, which is much more accurate, which is good news that we found it, it's not two-thirds in the C/D. It's 2/3 in the A/B. So we got the wrong assumption to do it, totally wrong by fault. Most of them were not even here. So I cannot blame anybody else. Because of that wrong assumption, we did what [cues a store] likes. We did wrong what [cues a store], the assortment.
So we said, "We are going to transform those stores similar to Walmart Express, same price, much simpler, much simpler the e-commerce, and customers are going to pay less, shop fast, and they're going to come and say thank you." They didn't come. Worse, for a while, it went well because it was COVID. They were buying from e-commerce convenience. So we misled ourselves. Then it collapsed for other reasons as well that you don't see. Because we merged everything Walmart, when you enter our site, you can choose which store you want, a Supercenter or an Express. Which one would you choose if the promise of delivery is the same, the price is the same, one of the bigger assortment? So internally, we move a lot of the traffic to Supercenter.
And then I can go on for hours, but I may cry, so it's better that I stop here. So we are stopping by redefining the value proposition. Oh gosh, it's so difficult, isn't it? Well, it's in Central America, the right value proposition, by the way. It's not that difficult, but it's there. So I think, I hope it is improving. And the format takes a little bit of time, but this time, just look in the next few months. We need to do it fast. So I don't need you to trust me. Just go and see in the next few months. It's going to improve. Don't expect to see a Market City or whatever it's called, City Market, whatever it's called. Don't expect to see it, but it's going to be good. It's $1 billion out of 50, but it's a big pain.
Thank you, Gui. Thank you, Fede. You definitely follow the script to end in a high. So let me then just say a couple of things. I mean, just so you know, a couple of hours ago, we actually reported or published our annual report. And just in case of you, it's actually to read the 300+ pages of our annual report. Secondly, and more importantly, just a thank you, a couple of thanks to say. First of all, thanks of you to all that came here today. You invested one day of your time to listen to what we had to say today on the Walmex Day. And because you are following us, thank you very much on behalf of Walmex. Thank you very much, the ones that are online watching this live streaming and also spent or invested your time in following us.
A third one, a big thanks to my team, IR, that have been working endless hours in the last couple of weeks to prepare this show, to the teams of communications that are here spending a lot of hours as well in the last week and IT, but also the broader team. I see other people from finance there that have been working there on those hours. A lot of people out there in that corner that have been working for weeks and weeks and weeks on this event. So thank you all. Enjoy today.
Thanks a lot.