Summary
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), authorizes retail grocers, called regular WIC vendors, to provide the food benefit. Recently, some states have seen an increase in vendors called WIC-only vendors, who stock only WIC food and accept only WIC vouchers. Both vendor types accept WIC vouchers in exchange for a cash payment, or redemption, from WIC state agencies with U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) grant funds. To determine what effect WIC-only vendors' growth would have on program expenditures, in the absence of recent cost containment legislation, Congress asked GAO (1) what is known about WIC-only vendors' growth and their share of the WIC market in recent years, (2) to what extent do WIC-only and regular WIC vendors differ, and (3) what would WIC-only vendors' contribution to WIC program expenditures have been, if their market share increased. GAO analyzed national WIC vendor data, interviewed WIC state officials about vendors' business practices, and analyzed redemption data from California, Texas and Florida.
The number of WIC-only vendors has tripled since 1999, with growth concentrated in a few states. However, WIC-only vendors' share of the national WIC market was relatively small compared to that of regular WIC vendors in 2004. Nationally, WIC-only vendors increased in number from 394 in 1999 to 1,180 in 2004, but 84 percent of these vendors are in California, Texas, and Florida. Despite their growth, WIC-only vendors accounted for 3 percent of all WIC vendors nationwide, and their market share, that is, their percentage of all WIC redemptions nationally, was on average 6 percent in 2004. Because of limitations in the data, we were unable to calculate annual growth rates or analyze changes in market share over time. WIC-only and regular WIC vendors generally employed different business and marketing practices, largely in response to the two different customer groups they served, according to WIC state agency officials. Because WIC participants are not required to consider retail prices, WIC-only vendors competed for participants' business by emphasizing customer service, which participants seemed to value. On the other hand, regular WIC vendors served non-WIC consumers as well as WIC participants. Because these non-WIC consumers are price sensitive, regular WIC vendors competed for their business based on price and competitors' behavior. An important difference in these approaches was that because WIC participants were not price sensitive, they might choose the service offered by WIC-only vendors, regardless of price. Finally, WIC-only and regular WIC vendors used similar food purchasing practices, because the cost of food purchased for resale is related more to the volume purchased than to the type of vendor purchasing the food. Both WIC-only and regular WIC vendors were able to lower the average cost of food purchased for resale when they bought in volume, according to WIC state agency officials. If WIC-only vendors' market share in 2004 had doubled in California, Texas, and Florida, either about 3 percent--about 136,000--fewer participants could have been served in each state, or program food expenditures would have increased about 3 percent--about $50 million--according to our scenario estimates. The average value of all vouchers redeemed by WIC-only vendors in 2004 was higher than the average value of all vouchers redeemed at regular WIC vendors. Thus, if the number of vouchers redeemed by WIC-only vendors had increased and state food expenditures remained at 2004 levels, fewer vouchers could have been issued, and fewer participants served. Conversely, if the number of vouchers issued remained at 2004 levels, the higher average value of vouchers redeemed at WIC-only vendors would have resulted in increased program expenditures. However, the price and quantity of the individual food items that make up the vouchers were not available to us; therefore we could not determine if the higher average value of vouchers meant that prices for individual food items were higher at WIC-only vendors. Making price comparisons would require food item price and quantity data for both WIC-only and regular WIC vendors, at a minimum.
Recommendations
Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change
from "In process" to "Implemented" or "Not implemented" based on our follow up work.
Director:
Team:
Phone:
Kay E. Brown
Government Accountability Office: Education, Workforce, and Income Security
(202) 512-7202
Recommendations for Executive Action
Recommendation: To assist WIC state agencies in more effectively monitoring WIC vendors' redemption practices, in implementing the new cost containment requirements, and in analyzing program expenditures, the Secretary of Agriculture should require, if collection of more detailed information on WIC food purchases is cost-effective through electronic benefits transfer implementation, that WIC state agencies collect data on both the price and the quantity of each WIC food item purchased, especially in each state that authorizes WIC-only vendors.
Agency Affected: Department of Agriculture
Status: In process
Comments: The response to the recommendation by the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS), which oversees the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), remains unchanged. FNS reports that WIC state agencies' implementation of electronic benefits transfer (EBT) systems still is proceeding slowly. Two state agencies have implemented EBT statewide now and a few states have EBT systems in some areas. In fall 2007, FNS developed a national UPC database to support state agency EBT operations and it is being pilot tested in six states. However, FNS hesitates to require state agencies to collect data on the price and quantity of each WIC food item purchased until further experience with the feasibility and cost effectiveness of WIC EBT systems is gained.
