Arts & Culture

Meet Walmart Heiress Alice Walton, the World’s 2nd-Richest Woman

Walmart’s Alice Walton is one of the richest women in the world.
AP Photo/Danny Johnston

Alice Walton, the only female heiress to the Walmart fortune, is one of the richest women in the world.

The three Walmart heirs — Rob Walton, Jim Walton, and Alice Walton — have a combined wealth of more than $250 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

The 74-year-old Alice Walton has an estimated fortune worth $84 billion and ranks 19th on Bloomberg’s list. She’s the second-richest woman in the world, behind only L’Oréal heiress Françoise Bettencourt Meyers.

Despite the Waltons’ high status, their personal lives remain largely private. Here’s what we know about how Alice Walton spends her fortune, from collecting expensive art to breeding horses:

Alice Walton, the only daughter of Walmart founder Sam Walton, is one of the world’s richest women.

Alice Walton is one of Walmart founder Sam Walton’s three kids.
Rick T. Wilking/Getty Images

Walton and L’Oréal heiress Françoise Bettencourt Meyers regularly alternate in the #1 spot.

Unlike her brothers, Rob and Jim, Alice Walton has never taken an active role in running Walmart and has instead become a patron of the arts.

She isn’t active in running the family business.
Rick T. Wilking/Getty Images

Walton fell in love with the arts at a young age, according to a New Yorker profile. When she was 10, she bought her first work of art: a reproduction of a Picasso painting for $2, she told the publication.

After graduating from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, in 1971, Walton briefly entered the family business, working for Walmart as a buyer of children’s clothes, she told The New Yorker.

But her career really began in finance, which led her to founding Llama Company, an investment bank, in 1988.

She has been married and divorced twice and has no children.

Walton has an immense private art collection, with original works from legendary American artists including Andy Warhol, Norman Rockwell, and Georgia O’Keefe.

Walton instead focuses on the arts.
Sylvain Gaboury/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images

“Collecting has been such a joy, and such an important part of my life in terms of seeing art, and loving it,” she told The New Yorker.

In 2011, she opened a $50 million museum called Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas, to house her $500 million private art collection.

The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas.
REUTERS/Jacob Slaton

When it opened, it had four times the endowment of the famous Whitney Museum in New York.

In 2014, the Walmart heiress dropped $44.4 million on a piece of artwork by Georgia O’Keeffe.

Alice Walton set a record with her purchase of a painting of a flower by Georgia O’Keeffe.
D Dipasupil/Getty Images

It was the most expensive sale of a work of art by a female artist in history. Walton later put it on display at her museum in Arkansas.

Walton has donated millions to the arts and other causes.

Jim Walton, Alice Walton, and Rob Walton cheer at the annual shareholders meeting for Walmart in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
REUTERS/Rick Wilking

In January 2016, Walton donated 3.7 million of her own Walmart shares — worth about $225 million at the time — to the family’s nonprofit, the Walton Family Foundation, Fortune reported. The next year, the charity gifted $120 million to the University of Arkansas to establish a School of Art.

She used to sit on the foundation’s board of directors alongside four other Waltons.

Walton also has her own charitable organization, the Alice L. Walton Foundation, which donates to causes including the arts, education, and health, according to its website.

Walton has also put some of her money into politics.

Hillary Clinton was once a Walmart board member.
Justin Sullivan/Getty

She has traditionally given to Republican candidates and PACs, though Walton donated $353,400 to the Hillary Victory Fund, a joint fundraising committee supporting Clinton and other Democrats, in 2016, according to Forbes.

The two women met while Clinton was serving as First Lady of Arkansas and was the only woman sitting on Walmart’s board.

Walton has been active in the horse breeding scene in Texas, but in 2015 she said she was going to devote more of her time to her Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art.

Alice sold her Rocking W Ranch in Millsap, Texas, in 2017.
Courtesy of WilliamsTrew

“I’ve been stretched in too many directions and I want to get focused,” Walton said, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in 2017. “I’ve got a house in Fort Worth, so I’m moving to town.”

In 2017, she sold her Millsap, Texas ranch for an undisclosed amount. The Rocking W Ranch had an initial asking price of $19.75 million but was later reduced to $16.5 million. The working ranch boasted more than 250 acres of pasture and outbuildings for cattle and horses.

She’d also put another Texas ranch, the 4,416-acre Fortune Bend Ranch, on the market around the same time.

Walton had multiple Texas ranches.
Courtesy of WilliamsTrew

She also cut its listing price, to $22.1 million. The property has a modest three-bedroom home overlooking nearly five miles of river frontage.

Walton also bought a two-floor condo on New York City’s Park Avenue for $25 million in 2014.

A view of Walton’s building on Park Avenue in Manhattan.
Google Maps

The condo, which had been owned by late financier Christopher H. Browne, has more than 52 large windows overlooking Central Park and the city, as well as a media room and a library.

In 2015, protesters gathered outside Walton’s building to demand a $15 minimum wage for Walmart employees. In 2023, the median wage for workers at Walmart, the world’s largest private employer, was $27,642.

Tanza Loudenback contributed to an earlier version of this story.


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