A Walmart Supercenter is a fluorescent palace of American consumption.
To US shoppers, it’s a utilitarian one-stop shop where groceries, televisions, tires, and just about everything else sit beneath one enormous roof.
To some international World Cup fans, though, it is a viral tourist sensation. Many fans made a point to visit Walmart during their stay in the United States. Even Spanish soccer star Lamine Yamal shopped there between matches.
Walmart said it organized the tours to seize on all the attention. Over the past month or so, the retailer has worked with the professional Spanish soccer league, LaLiga, to offer guided store tours paired with appearances by some of soccer’s biggest names.
I attended the final tour at Walmart’s East Brunswick, New Jersey, store on Saturday, about 29 hours before Spain and Argentina were scheduled to kick off the 2026 World Cup final.
On the tour, guests received VIP lanyards, giveaway bags, and small “passports” to be stamped as they moved through a carefully curated version of the Walmart experience.
The featured main attractions: peanut butter, ground beef, soccer jerseys, and — of course — ranch dressing.
America’s surprising superstore star
As soccer-loving (er, football-loving?) travelers crisscrossed the country for this year’s World Cup games, some of the most ubiquitous fixtures of American consumer culture inspired genuine awe: a cheap Waffle House breakfast, the sprawling excess of a Buc-ee’s gas station, and the giant aquariums inside Bass Pro Shops.
Videos went viral after a crowd of Australian national team fans turned a Dallas Walmart’s produce section into an impromptu party. Wearing yellow-and-green jerseys, they traded the familiar “Aussie! Aussie! Aussie! Oi! Oi! Oi!” chant for a new refrain: “We’re going to Walmart!”
The tours were Walmart’s effort to turn that organic wonderment into an official welcome — and to highlight its unique position as both a cornerstone of American consumerism and a place to get ranch dressing.
There was just one surprise at the tour I attended: The passport holders I spoke to were Americans.
Passports, ranch dressing, and rain
Walmart said it had expected international visitors at the East Brunswick event.
The store sits about 30 miles from MetLife Stadium, where Argentina star and overall legend Lionel Messi was set to chase a second World Cup title the following day. The outdoor LaLiga event — which included games, free food, and live music — also promised appearances from retired Spanish star Carles Puyol and Colombian striker Radamel Falcao.
About four hours before the player meet-and-greet, Walmart representatives handed tour guests giveaway bags containing about $35 in merchandise and small paper “passports.”
The first stop was the condiments aisle, where guides presented ranch dressing and peanut butter as American staples. Guests received a stamp in their passports before moving on.
Next came the meat department, where ground beef earned a steak-shaped stamp. We stopped near the apparel, where Walmart showed off soccer-themed jerseys and added one last mark to each passport.
Finally, we ended back in the produce section, where Walmart highlighted its best-selling product across the US: the banana. Walmart says they sell 4.46 billion bananas each year.
While Walmart said they expected international travelers in New Jersey, that wasn’t who showed up on Saturday. Everyone I spoke to said they all lived in the United States.
Karl Marttz, who lives 40 minutes away in North New Jersey, brought his children along for the tour while rain fell outside.
“As a person who lives near another Walmart, it was … eh,” he told Business Insider after the tour concluded. He was mostly there for the meet-and-greet.
A Walmart spokesperson told Business Insider it built the tours to “be relevant for first-time or longtime fans,” and that they were “happy from all of the positive feedback.”
Quickly after the tour, the weather soon worsened. A thunderstorm swept through, prompting organizers to move the meet-and-greet from the parking lot into the store.
That put the soccer stars under the same enormous roof as the now-Walmart-product-passport-holding Americans.
Nearly everyone I spoke with said they planned to watch the final on television the next day. One woman told the group she was going to MetLife Stadium to see Messi in person.
“I am so excited,” she said.
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