Business
Walmart Thanksgiving meal basket is 25% cheaper but has half as many items as last year
With Thanksgiving less than three weeks away, the question of how much this year’s turkey and trimmings will cost looms large, especially with grocery prices 2.7% higher than they were in 2024.
President Donald Trump has claimed over the past two days that costs for the Thanksgiving meal are down 25% this year, citing a prepackaged Thanksgiving meal basket from Walmart.
“I just saw that Walmart came out with a statement last night, they’ve done it for many years, that Thanksgiving this year will cost 25% less than Thanksgiving last year,” he said during a news conference on Friday with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
But Trump’s numbers are off. Here’s a closer look at the facts.
CLAIM: Walmart prices show that the cost of Thanksgiving dinner is 25% lower in 2025 than in 2024.
THE FACTS: This is misleading. While Walmart’s 2025 meal basket costs about 25% less than the one from 2024, that’s because it offers fewer items and different products that make it more affordable.
“It’s not apples to apples, right?” said David Anderson, a livestock economist at Texas A&M University. “What this does highlight is individual retailers’ strategies for getting customers in the door.”
The 2025 basket costs less than $40 and feeds 10 people, about $4 a head, according to Walmart. In 2024, a basket for eight cost approximately $56, less than $7 per person. That’s about a 25% decrease, possibly more depending on price fluctuations. John Furner, president and CEO of Walmart U.S., touted the savings in a LinkedIn post last month.
But the baskets differ significantly. For example, this year’s includes just 15 items compared to last year’s 29. It is missing many dessert items, including a pecan pie, mini marshmallows and muffin mix, as well as savory items such as sweet potatoes, yellow onions and celery stalks.
The superstore retailer has also substituted some products. Instead of 12 sweet Hawaiian rolls, the 2025 deal includes 12 dinner rolls. Both are from Walmart’s store brand. It also offers Kinder’s crispy fried onions as opposed to French’s.
Plus, the amount of each item varies. Customers were promised a 10-16 pound turkey in 2024, but a 13.5 pound one this year. And they’ll get one can of cream of mushroom soup instead of two.
“They’re marketing it that ‘hey, this is a more affordable way,’ yet that implies that ‘man, stuff’s a lot more expensive,’” Anderson said. “I guess it’s good marketing.”
A Thursday press release from the White House also cited cheaper Thanksgiving deals at Lidl’s, Aldi’s, Target and Schnucks.
Target’s four-person meal costs less than $20, about the same as in 2024, but substitutes green beans and cream of mushroom soup for French bread and frozen corn — also not an apples-to-apples comparison.
Schnucks provided The Associated Press with a press release saying the retailer is offering consumers its lowest price on a frozen store-brand turkey in over 15 years. It declined further comment. Lidl US said it is offering its Thanksgiving meal at the lowest ever price and Aldi said its price was lower than 2024. Target and Walmart did not comment.
According to a recent report from Wells Fargo, the cost of a 10-person Thanksgiving meal has fallen 2% to 3% since 2024, depending in part on whether customers go for national name brands or cheaper store labels. The White House press release also cited this report.
Some economists have concerns about the price of turkey. Purdue University’s College of Agriculture reported at the end of October that wholesale prices are up 75% since October 2024, while retail prices are 25% higher than a year ago.
An earlier analysis from the American Farm Bureau Federation found that wholesale turkey prices were up about 40%.
And yet, that doesn’t mean every bird will be pricier in 2025. Anderson explained that because certain retailers, such as Walmart, contract their turkeys well in advance, the price for customers might be much lower than the market currently indicates.
“That gives them the flexibility to run those types of specials,” he said.
