---
title: "Walmart Is Rolling Out Floor-Cleaning Robots in 1,500 Stores"
description: "Walmart is sending autonomous custodial robots to 1,500 stores in a play to cut down on the tasks human employees have to face."
date: "2019-04-10"
modified: "2019-04-10"
authors:
  - name: "Dan Robitzski"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/danrobitzski"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/walmart-floor-cleaning-robots"
categories:
  - "Robotics"
  - "Robots and Machines"
tags:
  - "automation"
  - "robots"
  - "the digest"
  - "walmart"
---

# Walmart Is Rolling Out Floor-Cleaning Robots in 1,500 Stores

![Walmart is sending autonomous custodial robots to 1,500 stores in a play to cut down on the tasks human employees have to face.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/walmart-floor-cleaning-robots.png>)
*\<em\>Image: Tag Hartman-Simkins\</em\>*

## Clean Many Robots

Walmart is about to bring worker robots to a third of its stores.

Of the corporation's 4,600 U.S. locations, 1,500 are about to start using floor-cleaning custodial robots and 300 will use the bots to spot empty shelves, [according to *The Wall Street Journal*](<https://www.wsj.com/articles/walmart-is-rolling-out-the-robots-11554782460?mod=e2tw&ns=prod/accounts-wsj>). It's a move that could save human employees a lot of time, but also one that signals that Walmart considers sees [human employees](<https://futurism.com/walmart-robot-janitors>) and their salaries as circumventable expenses.

## Time To Pivot

"With automation, we are able to take away some of the tasks that associates don’t enjoy doing," Mark Propes, a Walmart operations director, told the *WSJ*. "At the same time, we continue to open up new jobs in other things in the store."

Those other jobs are likely related to e-commerce, *WSJ* reports, as Walmart plans to pivot to more online sales in an attempt to [challenge Amazon](<https://www.wsj.com/articles/walmart-builds-a-secret-weapon-to-battle-amazon-for-retails-future-11553181810?mod=article_inline>).

**READ MORE:** [Walmart Is Rolling Out the Robots](<https://www.wsj.com/articles/walmart-is-rolling-out-the-robots-11554782460?mod=e2tw&ns=prod/accounts-wsj>) \[*The Wall Street Journal*\]

**More on Walmart:** *[Walmart Is About to Deploy Hundreds of Robot Janitors](<https://futurism.com/walmart-robot-janitors>)*

## Author
Dan Robitzki is a senior reporter for Futurism, where he likes to cover AI, tech ethics, and medicine. He spends his extra time fencing and streaming games from Los Angeles, California.

### Author social links  
[Twitter](<https://x.com/danrobitzski>)