Anthony Soto Director of Supplier Diversity Walmart Merchandising

Anthony Soto serves as the director of Supplier Diversity for Walmart Merchandising in Bentonville, Arkansas. Soto is responsible for partnering with the company’s procurement structures to create business opportunities for minority- and women-owned businesses. He assists with the growth and development of the company’s more than 2,500 minority- and women-owned suppliers. Soto serves as one of the company’s liaisons to organizations such as National Minority Supplier Development Council, Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and the Billion Dollar Roundtable.

In 1998, Soto joined Walmart as an hourly associate while attending college. Soto was promoted to assistant store manager within two years of joining the company. In this position he was recognized as one of the company’s Rising Star Assistant Managers, and was promoted a year later  to co-manager for a high volume Supercenter in Columbia, South Carolina. He played an integral role in reducing the store’s inventory losses by more than one half.

Soto was recruited in 2002 to open the first Supercenter in Charlotte, North Carolina. Two years later, he was recruited by senior leadership to be an operations coordinator based out of the corporate offices. In this position he led a 28-store focus project surrounding New York City. As an operations coordinator he was positioned to learn the overall operations of the company’s Shoes and Jewelry Division. In a few short months, he was promoted to Shoes and Jewelry regional manager and then senior manager of Supplier Diversity in 2005.

This move helped propel the company’s Diversity Initiatives to the forefront for both Walmart and the communities they serve.  As senior manager, Soto had the responsibility for the service areas for Supplier Diversity.  Since joining the team in 2005, Walmart has garnered more than 20 accolades celebrating and honoring the company’s work around Supplier Diversity. In 2009, Soto was a recipient of the “Champions of Diversity” award by Diversitybusiness.com.

He is married to his high school sweetheart, Alexandria. They are the proud parents of a daughter, Jasmine, and son, A.J.

Soto is active in his community, serving his church, the American Heart Association of Northwest Arkansas as a board member, board member for the Georgia Minority Supplier Development Council and Supplier Diversity Committee member for the Food Marketing Institute (FMI).