Results
The Challenge
Thermos is a category-defining maker of insulated food and beverage containers, and Walmart is a year-round business with one defining season. From late July through September, as families prepare for back-to-school, the brand earns the majority of its Walmart sales.
Thermos partnered with Blue Wheel at the end of July, with peak demand only days away. The opportunity was clear: a trusted brand, a strong product line, and room to focus investment on the products with the greatest potential. The challenge was timing. Every change had to strengthen performance immediately, without putting peak-season revenue at risk.
Together, we set four goals:
- Capture the full value of back-to-school demand
- Grow sales faster than spend
- Show that growth came from the program itself, not seasonal lift
- Build a foundation that could support significantly greater investment
The Process
We brought a clear recommendation to our first call with Thermos: a restructured Walmart Connect program, built for the season ahead and the year beyond it. Thermos approved the plan that week, and the work unfolded in three phases.
We launched the new program within two days, through a transition designed to protect peak-season revenue. Investment went to the products and placements where shopper demand was strongest, and the program was managed daily to match spend to activity.
In the first month, sales rose 221% on a 72% increase in spend. Those results built Thermos’ confidence and earned additional investment for the rest of the year.
With their peak season complete, we used the quieter months to study what was driving performance and to test new approaches where the stakes were low. The goal was to enter the next season with a sharper, more efficient program as competition for traffic continued to grow.
The strongest approaches were scaled in spring. By April, sales were up 330% year over year and cost per click was down 45%.
Rather than wait for peak, we continued to scale through the summer, and efficiency held. In June, typically the slowest month of the year, sales grew 354% year over year on a 202% increase in investment.
Investment increased again ahead of and through August, the most competitive window of the year. Cost per click stayed 48% below the prior year, and return on ad spend rose 56%.
The Solutions
Thermos didn’t need a bigger Walmart budget to grow. It needed a program worth investing in.
Strong, measurable results in the first season built the confidence to keep investing. Every budget increase that followed was earned through performance, with five increases over twelve months.
By the following peak, the results were clear:
- A full prior year of sales in 54 days, measured from the start of July
- The full Q3 sales target achieved by mid-August, with more than a month left in the quarter
- Sales up 636% on a 373% increase in investment, year over year at peak
Sales outpaced spend in every phase, including the quietest months of the year. That consistency shows the growth came from the program, not the season. Thermos now has a Walmart Connect program that becomes more efficient as investment grows.
