After the BrandZ Retail Ranking Went Viral: Why Exporters Should Look at NRF’s U.S. Retail Sales Ranking

Kantar BrandZ’s retail brand-value ranking has circulated widely in Chinese-language media, but it measures global brand assets, not U.S. sales or channel volume. For companies preparing to enter the U.S., the NRF Top 100 Retailers is usually a more practical first map.

1. Two rankings answer different questions

Kantar BrandZ’s 2026 ranking of the world’s most valuable retail brands has circulated widely in Chinese-language media. One common reading is that Amazon ranks first and Walmart second. That reading of the BrandZ ranking is correct. For readers seeking to understand U.S. retail, the more useful next step is to ask which question the ranking answers: “What is a brand worth as an intangible asset?” or “Where do U.S. customers spend most of their retail dollars?”

The BrandZ retail ranking measures brand value on a global basis. Brand value is closely related to sales and customer purchases: a strong brand is often chosen more frequently and can support a price premium and repeat business. But brand value is not the same as U.S. retail sales. Nor is it a measure of a retailer’s U.S. purchasing volume, shelf capacity, or fulfillment capability. Treating the ranking as a list of priorities for North American operations risks mistaking global brand salience for a map of U.S. demand.

The reference more commonly used in U.S. retail to answer “Who sold how much in the United States, and who handles how much customer demand?” is the National Retail Federation’s annual Top 100 Retailers, compiled with Kantar and ranked by U.S. retail sales. Kantar participates in both products. One focuses on the value of a global brand asset; the other is closer to the reality of U.S. retail sales. For a reader trying to understand the U.S. home market, the latter is usually the more direct starting point.

2. Three related but distinct measures

The point is clarification, not opposition. Brand value often has a direct relationship with sales and customer choice. At the same time, brand value ≠ U.S. retail sales ≠ market capitalization.

According to Kantar’s published BrandZ methodology, brand value is calculated by multiplying Financial Value by Brand Contribution. The former isolates the portion of financial performance, such as profits, attributable to the brand. The latter draws on consumer research—using concepts including Meaningful, Different, and Salient—to assess the brand’s power to generate demand, support a premium, and create future potential. The question it answers is how many dollars the brand, as an intangible asset, contributes to enterprise value.

Because the measure incorporates financial performance and consumer-choice signals, it is naturally related to how well a business sells. But it is not a direct count of a retailer’s annual U.S. sales, a map of the formats where Americans spend, or a measure of the stores, warehouse clubs, drugstores, and home-improvement channels that handle everyday goods. Stock-market movements, merger expectations, and capital-market narratives are yet another set of coordinates.

The global BrandZ retail ranking is a category slice of a worldwide ranking. Secondary reporting puts the combined brand value of the top 20 retail brands in 2026 at about $1.09 trillion, roughly 18% above the previous year. It places Amazon first at approximately $396.2 billion in retail brand value, followed by Walmart at about $176.7 billion, Costco at $114.3 billion, and Home Depot at $87.6 billion. The ranking can include platform brands whose principal business is not in the United States. That is another reminder that it is primarily a global brand-asset table, not a ranking of retailers by U.S. sales.

3. The NRF Top 100 lens: U.S. retail sales

NRF published its 2026 Top 100 Retailers, compiled by Kantar, on July 1, 2026. The method is clear: rank retailers by U.S. retail sales in the most recent 52- or 53-week year. The measure generally includes U.S. retail activity only, excludes revenue from nonretail divisions, and follows established treatment of fuel sales for businesses principally operating gas stations. The 2026 edition still excludes restaurant chains, unlike some earlier editions. NRF emphasizes that large retail groups have increasingly varied revenue sources; this ranking focuses on retail-specific revenue rather than total organizational revenue.

Using the 2025 U.S. retail-sales figures in NRF’s news release, the leaders were approximately:

1. Walmart — $579.99 billion, up about 4.2% year over year.

2. Amazon — $293.85 billion, up about 7.3%.

3. Costco Wholesale — $198.73 billion.

4. The Kroger Co. — $154.74 billion.

5. The Home Depot — $141.12 billion.

The side-by-side comparison shows how both rankings can be right. Amazon is commonly placed first in the BrandZ retail brand-value account, but Walmart remains the largest U.S. retailer by sales in the NRF ranking, with sales close to twice Amazon’s U.S. retail-sales figure. A company can lead on brand value while another leads on goods sold in the United States. For readers interested in the scale of U.S. channels and where customers spend their money, NRF’s U.S. retail-sales ranking is usually the more grounded primary table.

A note on the numbers. NRF’s complete ranking page shows Walmart’s “2025 USA retail sales” at approximately $575.99 billion, while its news release issued the same day gives about $579.99 billion—a difference of roughly $4 billion. Amazon and the next several retailers have consistent figures in the two places. The discussion below follows the order in the news release while preserving this uncertainty. Kantar and NRF also note that U.S. retail-sales figures may be estimated and may not match every line in a company’s own disclosures.

4. What U.S. retail sales reveal about the market

NRF’s sales table helps readers see the structure of U.S. customer demand. The retailers that sell the most also point to the shopping occasions and supplier opportunities closest to everyday needs.

At the top are general merchandise and e-commerce fulfillment. Walmart and Amazon form two peaks of U.S. retail sales. Costco represents continued growth in warehouse clubs; its 2025 U.S. sales rose about 8.7% year over year, one of the faster rates among the top five. Grocery remains substantial. Kroger is firmly in the top five, while Albertsons, Publix, and strong regional players such as H-E-B keep everyday essentials prominent near the upper end of the table. A large part of the U.S. retail base remains fresh food, packaged food, and household necessities—not just a “pure e-commerce platform” story.

Home improvement and discount or off-price retail operate alongside them. Home Depot and Lowe’s anchor home improvement, while retailers such as TJX maintain growth in discount apparel and home goods. Drugstores and convenience retail, including CVS and Walgreens, are large enough to remind us that “retail” extends far beyond apparel and consumer electronics. NRF’s release also highlights the relative resilience of regional grocers, the rise of smaller hardware chains such as Ace Hardware into the top 20, and ranking changes driven by acquisitions, such as Dick’s Sporting Goods moving sharply upward after buying Foot Locker. These are features of the sales landscape that help explain what the U.S. market actually looks like.

Read through U.S. sales, the market has several layers: big-box retail, e-commerce fulfillment, warehouse clubs, groceries, drugstores, home improvement, and discount stores. The BrandZ retail ranking is better suited to understanding global brand salience and ecosystem premiums. The two can be used together: start with NRF to understand the U.S. market’s scale and formats, then use BrandZ to assess brand-asset strength. That is more useful on the ground than following one global brand-value rank alone.

5. Ask the right question and both tables become useful

The BrandZ ranking is worth reading, especially when the question concerns brand salience, intangible assets, or global comparisons. If the question is instead which retailers sell the most in the United States and which formats capture U.S. demand, the U.S. industry more often turns to the NRF Top 100 Retailers. Kantar helps compile that ranking too, but the measure is U.S. retail sales.

The practical reading is this: brand value is related to sales and purchases, but it is not U.S. retail sales or market capitalization. Use NRF’s sales ranking as the main table for retailer scale and the flow of U.S. customer spending. Use BrandZ as supporting evidence about brand salience and intangible value. Amazon can be first in retail brand value while Walmart is first in U.S. retail sales. Once the measures are separated, the rankings become useful rather than merely eye-catching.

Main sources

• NRF news release: https://nrf.com/media-center/press-releases/nrf-releases-2026-top-100-retailers
• NRF 2026 Top 100 full list: https://nrf.com/research-insights/top-retailers/top-100-retailers/top-100-retailers-2026-list
• NRF Top 100 overview and FAQ: https://nrf.com/research-insights/top-retailers/top-100-retailers
• Kantar BrandZ methodology: https://www.kantar.com/campaigns/brandz/methodology
• Kantar BrandZ 2026 global ranking: https://www.kantar.com/campaigns/brandz/global
• Secondary reporting on retail brand-value figures: https://www.merca20.com/these-are-the-most-valuable-retail-brands-of-2026-who-dominates-global-commerce-according-to-kantar/

Numerical uncertainties

• NRF’s news release gives Walmart’s 2025 U.S. retail sales as $579.99 billion; its full-ranking page gives $575.99 billion, approximately $4 billion less. This article follows the news release’s ranking and notes the discrepancy.
• The specific BrandZ retail brand-value figures in dollars are taken mainly from secondary reporting on Kantar BrandZ 2026. They were not checked line by line against Kantar’s paid report; the article therefore says “approximately.”
• Amazon’s BrandZ total global brand value (about $1.02 trillion, fourth overall) is not the same measure as its retail category brand value (about $396 billion). The two should not be conflated.