Why You Can’t Find Kratom at Your Local Walmart—At Least Not Yet

Is kratom sold at Walmart anywhere in the US? This is a common question and the answer probably won’t surprise you: No.

Do you know why you can’t buy kratom capsules at Walmart?

There isn’t some conspiracy to keep you from finding kratom locally. On the contrary, Walmart would probably be happy to sell kratom if they could.

However, there are numerous factors that make the corporate giant reluctant about carrying the ancient herb. We’ll break them down for you below and explain what kind of kratom products you can get at your neighborhood Superstore.

Credit Cards Prevent Walmart from Selling Kratom

You’re probably familiar with the fact that credit cards are not accepted by all kratom vendors. But do you know why? It’s because many credit card processors won’t process payments for kratom.

It doesn’t matter that it is federally legal or that it remains unregulated in most U.S. states. Merchant processors view this herb as a gamble. Kratom’s high risk status likely owes to its history of being seized by authorities, which results in chargebacks.

Other factors that may have landed kratom on the high-risk list include select incidents of kratom-related death and overdose, as well as litigation by grieving or injured parties. Such incidents, isolated though they may be, cannot help but cast kratom in a negative light.

As a result, vendors that accept credit cards do so at the risk of having their accounts suspended or deleted, and their pending funds frozen by their merchant processor. When this happens, the vendor loses money and can no longer accept credit cards.

Walmart and similar retailers rely way too heavily on credit cards to take a chance. The risk of losing its payment option is not only counterintuitive to its goals, but potentially damaging to its financial security.

If this seems like something that would be small potatoes to a global hypermarket, lest we forget the losses it sustained after its improperly secured e-commerce platforms were breached. The breach in question resulted in millions of Walmart accounts ending up for sale on the Dark Web.

At the end of the day, Walmart was slapped with a class-action suit for failing to mitigate its vulnerabilities. This is to say nothing of the unusually high financial losses the store experienced in 2020, 4Q losses that topped $2 Billion despite record growth in revenue.

On average, Walmart makes $40.2 million per day nationwide. Even if its processor was down for a single day, it’d lose millions of dollars. Adding kratom to its product list  simply isn’t worth the potential loss.

The FDA and Walmart

The FDA presents another major hurdle for any business that wants to sell kratom. In fact, the agency and its enforcers have a history of seizing kratom shipments. Once this happens, the odds of getting the kratom back are slim to none.

In the past, the FDA has issued a public warning, urging U.S. residents against using kratom. At other times it has attempted to institute a nationwide ban on kratom, for the so-called good of America’s safety and well-being.

As fate would have it, the FDA kratom ban was reconsidered and postponed after it received an overwhelming number of comments from the public. The majority of these comments attested to the purported value of the kratom plant.

Regardless, the agency has not let this one go; kratom seizures have been reported as recently as May 21, 2021. The FDA’s website is even calling on consumers to report any adverse reactions to the FDA’s MedWatch program. This is oddly akin to what the AKA (American Kratom Association) has done in the past by gathering scientific data on kratom.

Alas, the FDA isn’t about to take a page from the nonprofit kratom advocacy group. At least not in terms of studying the science. Instead, the agency is satisfying its aim by listening to negative accounts from ill-experienced users, many of whom may have purchased substandard kratom from a smoke shop.

In some cases, kratom seizures have cost individual vendors as much as $5 million. Walmart steers clear of the entire debacle by choosing not to carry this herb in any of its stores.

Walmart Wants to Avoid Liability

As we just mentioned, the FDA has been clamping down on kratom, while families have filed lawsuits against companies that manufacture and sell kratom. Even though the evidence against kratom doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny, Walmart isn’t going to take any chances.

Major companies get sued frequently, and they sometimes lose even when they really haven’t done anything wrong. If Walmart were to lose a suit involving kratom, they’d probably owe millions or even billions in damages, to say nothing of the astronomical hourly rate of its legal team.

Put simply, the juice is not worth the squeeze for a chain that needs to preserve its reputation. Walmart has already had enough controversy to walk back. Between its racist and fat-shaming Halloween costumes, its N-word-riddled email game, and its tone-deaf ice cream flavor, Walmart’s had to make more concessions than a popcorn stand.

Buy Kratom Products at Walmart

Just because you can’t buy kratom powder, kratom extracts or kratom capsules at your local hypermarket that doesn’t mean you’ll leave emptyhanded. In response to the volume of searches for the phrase ‘buy kratom’ on its website, Walmart has added a number of kratom-themed items to its catalog.

While its refusal to stock a high-risk item such as kratom makes sound fiscal sense Walmart’s failure to acknowledge kratom culture would be another story altogether. Luckily for enthusiasts and Walmart’s bottom line alike, the brass decided to include kratom products in their inventory.

What does this mean? It means you can buy kratom-related stuff, such as kratom urine tests, kratom signs, and other assorted goodies, at Walmart.com.

Where Can I Buy Kratom Locally?

Now that you know the answer to “Can I buy Kratom at Walmart?” it’s time to move on to places where you actually can purchase it. Headshops are the biggest sellers in local areas.

If you’re unsure where to look, be sure to consult our Best Places to Buy Kratom Locally and Online guide. You can also get more ideas by checking out Tips for Buying Kratom Near Me.

If you want to make the entire process even easier, turn to online Kratom vendors. The Golden Monk and other reputable online sellers can often offer better quality, a larger selection, and lower prices than your local vendors.