The Mal’tsev product of two varieties of similar algebras is always a quasivariety. We consider when this quasivariety is a variety. The main result shows that if V is a strongly irregular variety with no nullary operations, and S is a variety, of the same type as V, equivalent to the variety of semilattices, then the Mal’tsev product V ◦ S is a variety. It consists precisely of semilattice sums of algebras in V. We derive an equational basis for the product from an equational basis for V. However, if V is a regular variety, then the Mal’tsev product may not be a variety. We discuss examples of various applications of the main result, and examine some detailed representations of algebras in V ◦ S.