11 Famous Brands Behind Walmart's Great Value Products

If you're a regular Walmart shopper, then you've probably purchased a fair number of Great Value products over the course of your adult life. They're reliably cheaper than name-brand products, and often, you can't even tell the difference. Many customers say Great Value products taste just as good if not better than the name brand.

Walmart officially debuted the Great Value brand in 1993 and, by the late 2000s, it had become the largest food brand in sales and volume nationwide. You're not going to find merely a hundred different Great Value products when you walk inside the store; you're going to find more than a hundred different Great Value product categories. It takes a lot of manpower and resources to make all those products, and it's not like there are Walmart factories and farms all across the country that are churning them out. 

Instead, Walmart relies on other manufacturers to supply it with Great Value products, and then it simply slaps on the Great Value logo. In some cases, those manufacturers are also the ones making the name-brand versions of the same foods. So, the reason you can't tell any difference between your can of name-brand peas and the Great Value option might just be because there's literally no difference at all. Same peas, different label. Don't believe us? Here are a handful of the famous brands behind Walmart's Great Value products.

Yes, the major name brand behind Walmart's Great Value bread is Sara Lee herself. So how do we know this? One of the easiest ways to track which manufacturers and famous brands are behind store-brand products is to keep an eye on food recalls. When a manufacturer issues a recall, they'll typically list every brand the recall impacts. So, if they list a famous name brand alongside a store brand, you can pretty accurately assume the two products came from the same manufacturing line.

This is what happened in 2015 when the maker of Sara Lee bread — Bimbo Bakeries — recalled nearly 50,000 packages of bread distributed across 11 states, after it was discovered the bread could contain glass from a broken factory lightbulb. The recall applied to Sara Lee products that were being sold under the Great Value brand, as well as the Kroger store brand and Nature's Harvest, among others. 

Bimbo Bakeries makes a whole lot more than just Great Value and Sara Lee bread. Part of what is claimed to be the largest baking company in the world, Bimbo Bakeries also produces Thomas' English muffins, BallPark buns and rolls, Entenmann's sweet treats, Cheesecake Factory at Home products, and more.

Similarly to Bimbo Bakeries, Conagra is a major food company that produces a ton of your favorite brands, as well as Great Value products. Within the Conagra family of brands, you'll spot Healthy Choice, Slim Jim, Marie Callender's, Hunt's, Duncan Hines, Vlasic, Banquet, Hebrew National, and more common household names. As such, it's a given that Conagra has the expertise necessary to produce a range of white label products, too (a white label product is any product made by one brand and sold to another brand that sells it as its own).

It became clear that Conagra produced Great Value items when a recall was issued that affected both Peter Pan and Great Value peanut butter. Unfortunately, things turned dangerous with this recall — and pretty costly for Conagra. The recall occurred in 2007, when the two peanut butters were linked to a salmonella outbreak. Supposedly, the salmonella bacteria grew on the raw peanuts used to make the products, after being stored in an environment that was overly moist due to a leaky roof and bad sprinkler system. 

More than 600 individuals fell ill during the outbreak. Conagra accordingly recalled all of the peanut butter manufactured between 2004 and 2007. The problem didn't end there, though. Federal criminal charges were brought against Conagra, and the company wound up paying more than $11 million to settle.

You may have strong feelings regarding your trash bags and food storage bags, but if you think Hefty is superior to Great Value in every way, you may just want to think again. Yep, that's right: Walmart's Great Value trash bags and food storage bags are made by Hefty.

This is a long-standing relationship, too. Walmart's commitment to Hefty as its Great Value bag manufacturer was confirmed in 2010, as the chain invested in its Great Value lineup in an effort to cater to shoppers dealing with a not-so-great economy (and in fact, it was reported that shoppers purchased a record-high amount of store brands versus name brands in 2009). However, 2010 was a rocky year for Hefty, and even with commitment from Walmart, the larger corporation that owned Hefty, Pactiv Corp., could not withstand its own economic woes. Later that year, Reynolds Group purchased Pactiv for around $4.4 billion.

Today, Reynolds still owns Hefty, alongside Reynolds Wrap and lesser-known brands like Diamond and Presto. As of 2023, we know that Reynolds was still making Great Value trash bags, as the company was involved in a lawsuit that claimed it was marketing the bags as recyclable, even though they were not. Reynolds settled and offered to pay $3 million and either remove the claim from packaging or make sure the bags were actually recyclable moving forward.

Sometimes a Great Value brand relationship is kept hush-hush and you have to do a little digging around into recalls and lawsuits to trace those connections. Other times, Walmart is loud and proud about its manufacturers. This is the case with Wells Dairy — and while you might not know Wells Dairy, you definitely know its biggest brand: Blue Bunny.

Wells Dairy began supplying Walmart with its ice cream from the 1980s onward, before Great Value was even launched. The company is headquartered in what's been called the Ice Cream Capital of the World: Le Mars, Iowa. There, farm-fresh milk travels less than half an hour to a manufacturing plant, where it becomes Great Value ice cream. Other ingredients that go into the ice cream, like cookies, are also made nearby. In addition to creating Great Value and Blue Bunny ice cream, Wells also makes Halo Top, Blue Ribbon Classics products, and Bomb Pops.

However, just because Wells Dairy makes both Great Value ice cream and all these other name brands, don't expect a vanilla Great Value pint to taste the same as what you'd get from Blue Bunny. The ingredients differ as does the taste. While some may find Great Value's flavor to be superior, they may be less pleased with ingredients like cellulose gel and carrageenan.

Butter can get pricey if you're not careful, but some home cooks are adamant that buying high-quality butter really does make all the difference in your cooking and baking. That said, if you've been sheepishly buying the Great Value butter due to the lower cost and thinking you're doing yourself a disservice, cheer up — Great Value butter isn't all that inferior, and in fact is very likely made by Land O'Lakes.

The theory stems from a packaging switcheroo that occurred in 2025, when shoppers who purchased Land O'Lakes butter opened up their boxes to find sticks of Great Value butter instead. Neither company has verified the claim that Land O'Lakes must make Great Value butter, but it definitely seems the most plausible explanation for the mix-up.

When you take into account the range of other products and services Land O'Lakes produces beyond its recognizable butter and similar dairy items, the idea that it could also make Great Value butter just makes sense. For example, Land O'Lakes produces Kozy Shack-branded products, as well as Vermont Creamery products. It sells ingredients for foodservice operations, including restaurants and schools. The company even makes animal feed, and we're not just talking feed for cattle or swine — zoos are among Land O'Lakes clients, too. Given all that, making a little extra butter would be nothing.

Perdue produces a large number of chicken products. You want chicken in just about any form? Chances are Perdue provides it, from fresh chicken breasts and pre-diced raw chicken nuggets to pre-grilled tenders — and Perdue is also sending chicken to your local Walmart under the guise of the Great Value brand.

This is another one of those connections that was revealed to the public via a recall. In 2010, Perdue Farms issued a recall that didn't even pertain to Perdue-branded products. Instead, it was all about Great Value. The company had shipped out some frozen Great Value chicken nuggets that were suspected to potentially contain "foreign materials." When a recall lists "foreign materials" as its cause, it can really mean anything wound up in the food — glass, metal, rocks, even wood — though in this case the material in question was blue plastic pieces.

This wasn't the last time that Perdue would need to recall some of its white label products, either. In 2019, it recalled chicken breast patties produced for Chef Quik, after bone fragments were found in the ready-to-eat chicken products. Then in 2024, it recalled organic chicken nuggets it had produced for Butcherbox, again due to foreign material (metal). 

Smucker's may be most well-known for its jams and jellies, but behind Smucker's is the J.M. Smucker Co., and it makes far more than just fruit preserves and ice cream toppings. Dunkin' coffee, Folgers, Hostess, Jif, Milk-Bone — they can all be traced back to J.M. Smucker. Beyond the sweet treats the company makes and sells under the Hostess banner, it has also historically made Great Value's bakery items. We know this thanks to a 2024 recall that impacted more than 40,000 cheese Danishes and cinnamon rolls, which J.M. Smucker issued specifically for Great Value.

However, as of 2026, it's been confirmed that J.M. Smucker no longer makes Great Value bakery products. While it's not entirely clear what went wrong, it may have been that the company abandoned those products at the same time that it divested its Cloverhill and Big Texas brands, in early 2025. 

When the divestment was announced, the company said it was turning over some of its private label products to JTM Foods, in order to prioritize its resources within the baked goods category and focus specifically on Hostess — so, it would make sense that the Great Value baked goods would get the boot. Furthermore, JTM Foods does indeed produce retailer private brands, though it's not immediately clear what they are.

The Krusteaz Company is most well-known for its namesake product line of pancake and waffle mixes, but it also makes products under other brands. For example, it owns the Buck Wild snack mix brand Alpine cider and WildRoots trail mix. It also makes Walmart's Great Value pancake and waffle mix, so if you've been paying extra for name-brand pancakes and waffles, it might be time to switch up your grocery haul.

Yet again, this is a connection we know about thanks to a recall. In 2022, Continental Mills (which changed its name to Krusteaz in recognition of Krusteaz's 90^th anniversary in late 2022) issued a recall for Great Value buttermilk pancake and waffle mixes, due to foreign material contamination. Pieces of a cable used in the manufacturing process broke into the mixes before they were distributed to stores across the country.

The recall woes didn't end there. In 2024, both Krusteaz and Great Value frozen waffles and pancakes were recalled, alongside a number of frozen waffles and pancakes sold under a wide range of other name and store brands, due to possible listeria contamination. In this case, the products had not been processed directly by Krusteaz. Instead, they were produced by TreeHouse Foods, which specializes in manufacturing private label foods on other brands' behalf, including everything from candy and cookies to pickles and pretzels.

Say "Wonderbrands" and you're probably going to think of — what else? — Wonder Bread, but the company makes other bread items, too, including those sold under the D'Italiano and Country Harvest brands. It's important to note that Wonder Bread in the United States is not the same as Wonder Bread in Canada.

In Canada, Wonder Bread is owned by the aforementioned Wonderbrands. In the United States, Wonder Bread and all associated Wonder products are owned by Flowers Foods. This is nothing new, either. The two Wonders have been completely separate since the 1920s. For our purposes, we're talking about the Canadian Wonder Bread and Wonderbrands, as the latter produces Great Value bread for Walmarts across Canada.

This fact came to light in late 2024, when a recall was issued for breads and buns produced by Wonderbrands and sold under the Great Value brand, as well as the Wonder brand and several others. The products had been distributed throughout Newfoundland, Labrador, Ontario, and Quebec. Seven different Great Value products were impacted in total.

Whether you're browsing the baking aisle for pecans or walnuts to throw into cookies or a pie, or strolling the snack aisle looking for a salty, crunchy bite to satisfy some cravings, you'll probably see a good amount of store shelf real estate taken up by the Fisher nuts brand. While the brand is technically owned by John B. Sanfilippo & Son, which includes a few other brands beneath the umbrella, Fisher is by and large the most recognizable of the bunch. The same people churning out those Fisher nuts are also churning out your Great Value nuts (meaning if you want to save money on your grocery bill, given the sometimes eye-wateringly high price of nuts, definitely switch to Great Value).

We know this to be the case due to a 2024 recall when John B. Sanfilippo & Son recalled Great Value honey roasted cashews due to undeclared ingredients. Often, if a product is recalled due to undeclared ingredients, it means the packaging failed to list certain ingredients that could cause serious or life-threatening reactions for people with an allergy. However, in this case, it was the fact that the packaging mentioned the wrong product altogether. Instead of honey roasted cashews like the packaging claimed, the containers were filled with coconut cashews — posing a potential problem for anyone with a coconut or milk allergy.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture records of establishments doing business as different brands, Tyson Foods Inc. also produces food for Walmart's Great Value brand. However, that's not the only store brand that Tyson caters to. You can also find Tyson products sold under the store brands at Costco, Aldi, Food Lion, Giant Eagle, Harris Teeter, Hannaford, Kroger, Meijer, Public, Safeway, Target, and Sam's. 

In other words, for just about any store-brand chicken you buy, chances are good that Tyson probably produced it. Keep in mind that Tyson Foods doesn't just make chicken, even if that's the food most synonymous with the name. Tyson Foods also owns Jimmy Dean sausage, Hillshire Farm, BallPark hot dogs, Hillshire meats, and many other brands. In other words, Tyson has its fingers in a lot of pies.

One Reddit user who previously worked at Tyson supported this claim further in 2025. One of their job duties was to spend part of their time filling Tyson plastic bags of chicken breasts, before switching to filling Great Value bags with the same chicken breasts.