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Dollar General Hits a Gold Mine in Rural America
- paulpauper 9y agoDollar Stores are a terrible deal. The products not only tend to be inferior but they skimp on the quantity, so you end up paying a much higher per-unit price than had you shopped at Walmart or anywhere else.
- warrenm 9y agoconvenience + not outrageous prices (more than Walmart ... but way closer and faster) + and [generally] friendly staff == solid business results
- burger_moon 9y agoSame thing with Harbor Freight. It's fast to go in and grab a tool, they're cheap, and they have everything.
- samstave 9y agoWhile I never buy anything there, I have been impressed with their ads for how cheap good tools are from HB
- duskwuff 9y agoHarbor Freight doesn't sell "good tools". They sell cheap tools. Often it's good enough to work with, but nothing they sell is anything you'd want to rely on for daily use.
- bbarn 9y agoAs a big fan of quality tools, I find they are useful for certain things you really can't justify the cost of. i.e., I need this stupid security torx screwdriver. Need a new air compressor hose or connectors, bulk shop rags, bungee cords, etc.
- warrenm 9y agoAnd "good enough" is just that - good enough. Same with Northern Tool & Supply: some things just don't matter where you get them. Wrote about it 6+ years ago - https://antipaucity.com/2011/02/24/how-much-does-quality-matter/#.WeelQxNSzgo https://antipaucity.com/2011/02/24/how-much-does-quality-mat...
- warrenm 9y agoAnd they're good enough for the majority of people and the majority of tasks the majority of the time
- madengr 9y agoDG has Chicken Ramen flavored Pringels which my 11 YO was dying to try. Turns out they are gross.
- pwinnski 9y agoDollar General has amazing logistics end-to-end, possibly better than Walmart. Clearly the difference is enough to make them profitable, if barely, in circumstances Walmart isn't. What's new information for me is that DG can make things work in tiny towns that only support a single store. A lot of what I've read about their strengths in the past had to do with how well they manage multiple stores in one city.
- brianbreslin 9y agoThe cost to setup a dollar general has to be 1/100th of the cost of a walmart store. Are they franchises or company owned?
- crushedpeanuts 9y agoArticle says 15m to start a new Supercenter, 250k for a DG
- codewritinfool 9y agoIn my hometown, Wal-Mart left years ago and now there are 5 DG stores within a 5 mile radius. The town only has 5000 people or so. All of those stores stay busy.
- deadmetheny 9y agoAnother strength is that the stores just simply aren't that big. I've been to Wal-Marts in rural parts of the lower Midwest that are simply too huge for the population density. Somehow they manage to stay open, but I am never entirely sure how. DG, on the other hand, tends to be half to a third of the size and does very well on the basis that they pretty much only sell stuff that people are actually gonna need on a regular basis. Combine that with the logistics you mentioned, and it's bound to be able to at least sustain itself.
- eberkund 9y agoI guess since the land is cheap and they built the building they operate out the operating cost isn't much higher like it would be were they renting space in a developed urban area. Plus it is like they are investing in the real estate as I've seen a few small towns grow a lot in population after Walmart moved in.
- btown 9y agoReferral link for paywall: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwic64KH0PrWAhVB0oMKHUkbBmgQFggoMAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bloomberg.com%2Fnews%2Ffeatures%2F2017-10-11%2Fdollar-general-hits-a-gold-mine-in-rural-america&usg=AOvVaw3wyjgi-k7q_xhUqXnVi2xz https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&c...
- gervase 9y ago“Essentially what the dollar stores are betting on in a large way is that we are going to have a permanent underclass in America. It’s based on the concept that the jobs went away, and the jobs are never coming back, and that things aren’t going to get better in any of these places.” That's a pretty strong quote to bury halfway through the article.
- occultist_throw 9y agoI would concur with that paragraph. When I was driving through South Indiana and Kentucky, I saw dollar store after dollar store after Dollar Store. I would see a little town with one to three dollar stores. These little towns all had something in common. They had no noticeable industry, very limited business opportunities, and dilapidated and or dying community. My and assessment, just driving through, is that these towns were all dead ends. I really hate saying that about people because it shouldn't be true. But for all intents and purposes they looked like they were in the last stage of existence.
- smelendez 9y agoBut would people still shop at dollar stores if they had more money? I sort of think so--New York is incredibly prosperous, and there are dollar stores everywhere, visited by rich and poor.
- occultist_throw 9y agoI can't speak for New York. I've never been there. My experiences are that of portions of the Midwest in Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, Missouri. Larger places will have Walmarts and will have grocers and more industry. What I see time and again our little towns that are too small to support even a Walmart or a grocery have one or two Dollar Generals. I'm not an economist and not sure what to make of that other than that a Dollar General seem to be pretty cheap to set up pretty cheap to stock and I guess and implicit acknowledgement that these markets are failures for anything other than dinky stores. (edit: android voice to text mistakes)
- 9y ago
- kcorbitt 9y agoThere's a Dollar Tree (competitor to Dollar General with a similar business model) in South San Francisco that I shop at sometimes for cleaning supplies/paper goods/party items. I wouldn't trust most of their food offerings, but for the sort of thing I buy there they generally charge 30-50% of what a traditional grocery store in the area does. I have no idea how they can make this business model work with the cost of rent in the area, but I love it.
- huehehue 9y agoThe stuff Dollar Tree sells is reeeeally low quality. Take a cheap, dishwasher-safe, plastic cup for example. I can get those in bulk from Alibaba for $0.10 / cup. Dollar Tree might sell something like that for $1.00 -- there's a bunch of additional overhead, of course, but I think it makes perfect sense that they'd profit on stuff like that. Also would not be surprised if they shrugged those losses off as marketing (brand recognition / visibility) costs.
- brianbreslin 9y agoI had a friend who sold software to run generic dollar stores. It was fully integrated POS -> inventory, etc. He was making a ton of money traveling to tiny towns across America.
- thomas_howland 9y agoHow is "software to run dollar stores" different from generic retailing software?
- jsonne 9y agoMost point of sale software is incredibly fragmented down to hyperspecific use cases. A former company I worked with was partnered with a POS software that was made to service plane re-fueling stations for regional airports if that gives you an idea how segmented that market is.
- brianbreslin 9y agowhat @jsonne said. They had specific controls built in for inventory management, automatic re-stocking, etc. Also I think it had to accept EBT payments for certain food items as well.
- mywittyname 9y agoI used to work in POS and you'd be surprised at how difficult it is to produce uniform POS software. It seems like all retailers have slightly different ways they want things done and were willing to pay, what to me is, a surprisingly large amount of money for their differentiations. It's extremely common for these companies to consider their POS/supply chain software is a core competency. So Major Dollar Store A would want to make absolutely sure that none of their code changes would be made available to Major Dollar Store 1, even if it were mundane stuff like tax code changes. On one hand, it's good money, because it is such an integral part of their business. On the other hand, it can be tedious to redo the same thing after the sales staff sells the same customizations with minor differences.
- brianbreslin 9y agoThere is a Japanese competitor growing in the US recently. I have seen a few of them in San Francisco. Interesting to see their take on this concept vs American version. http://www.daisojapan.com/ http://www.daisojapan.com/
- smelendez 9y agohttps://flyingtiger.com/ https://flyingtiger.com/ -- And this is a Danish competitor, also popping up in the US. Has a vibe similar to the non-furniture section in Ikea.
- coreymaass 9y agoI love Flying Tiger. Since it's still novel in America, it's the perfect place to get holiday gifts.
- swang 9y agodaiso is more akin to dollar tree, in that their products are generally priced at $1.50 (they carry more expensive stuff, and some $1 snacks). dollar general seems to just be a convenience store
- beingmyself2 9y agoDuring my trip to LA I made time to visit the Daiso. They have a lot of neat stuff you don't generally find in other dollar stores and to me the products seem to be of higher quality (whatever that means for dollar store items).
- TheAdamAndChe 9y ago> Essentially what the dollar stores are betting on in a large way is that we are going to have a permanent underclass in America. It’s based on the concept that the jobs went away, and the jobs are never coming back, and that things aren’t going to get better in any of these places. Given the fact that the government hasn't changed tune since the 2016 election, I'd say that's a pretty safe bet. Rural America has been decimated by globalization, anti-trust legislation removal, illegal immigration, and automation, yet the only things the politicians and media are talking about are issues that most rural folk don't care about.
- jeromegv 9y agoHow has illegal immigration decimated rural america?
- TheAdamAndChe 9y agoWe live in a country with ~300 million citizens, and ~10 million illegal immigrants. That means that illegal immigrants only make up about 3% of the population, which doesn't sound like much! However, illegal immigrants are spread _very_ unevenly across the country[1], creating pockets where lower-class American wages are suppressed[2]. The effect of illegal immigration isn't nearly as strong as globalization and anti-trust legislation removal, but it is there, and is definitely felt in those areas affected. The "decimation" comes from the cumulative effect of all of those factors(globalization, anti-trust legislation removal, illegal immigration, and automation) pushing jobs out of the area and lowering wages. [1]http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2274081/Pew-Hispanic-Center-Interactive-map-shows-concentration-illegal-immigrants-state-state-America.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2274081/Pew-Hispanic... [2] https://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21705699-who-are-main-economic-losers-low-skilled-immigration-wage-war https://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21705699-who-ar...
- samstave 9y agoWell, one should also account for gumption. Those illegal immigrants are standing outside every Home Depot waiting to provide labor for any job you can give them. I've never seen a white or black person standing outside a Home Depot just hoping that someone will come hire them. Also, think about the last time you ate food: that food was likely picked by an illegal Mexican immigrant or cooked by a Mexican chef. I ate at Kobe Japan restaurant in Walnut Creek for a hibachi meal - the chef was named Jose. If a Mexican rapture ever happened - many people would starve to death. The work ethic of Mexicans is beyond the pale...
- bluedino 9y agoThey are rated 2.8, which is below the 3.2 rating that Walmart has on Glassdoor. Low pay, long hours, everyone is a 'manager'... I go there often as they have much lower prices on snacks/drinks than convenience stores or Walgreens, and there's one very close to my apartment if I need anything else from cleaning supplies to a can of chicken broth and don't feel like making a trip to Walmart or Kroger. And there are stores in each of the small towns up north I vacation at. They're often the only store in town and there's always a line on the weekends, people buying snacks and coolers and beach supplies. The stores are bare minimum, no flooring other than concrete, merchandise all over the place, and usually 1 employee working.
- lazerpants 9y agoGiven the low employee ratings on Glassdoor, and the low pay mentioned in the article, how do you feel about supporting them as a business?
- bluedino 9y agoThe other two options I have are Speedway (gas station) and RiteAid (drugstore), who are rated 2.7 and 3.0 respectively.
- Severian 9y agoYeah, I talk to the employees who work at our local DG, just a few hundred yards away from my front-door. They are basically paid just above minimum wage, and there is NEVER more than two scheduled at the same time; usually with only an hour overlapping. It is very hard for them to stock, clean, and help customers when you are tied to a register due to traffic. Not to mention changing price tags, taking out refuse, unloading a truck, and doing all the million things a store needs done a day. The store is messy, but I really can't blame them. They are understaffed and underpaid by design. I would not call DG an ethical company in any regard with the way they treat their employees.
- schnevets 9y agoI can't help but compare that to the family-owned dollar store around the corner from me. Same three Indonesian guys (and occasionally a woman - probably someone's wife) stocking shelves and running the register. In those situations, I assume it's a co-ownership where it's easy to motivate one-another. Anecdotally, the prices are competitive and the store is clean (although products are haphazardly arranged), so I wonder what a chain dollar store can provide that these entrepreneurs can't.
- Atlas 9y agoTwo Dollar General stores separated by a mile popped up in my hometown in northern California, a place that can barely support two of any stores even grocery stores. Dollar General stores are expensive and nearly always empty. When I lived in the south eight years ago, Dollar General stores were expensive and empty too. I would not be surprised at some point if the economics of their expansion didn't make sense. As someone else mentioned, Dollar Tree is different. There is a Dollar Tree that is always packed next to an empty Dollar General in my hometown. Dollar Tree is a deep discount store. Dollar General is a convenience store without gas.
- Spooky23 9y agoDollar General is like Krispy Kreme was year ago. They are in hyper growth building stores everywhere. Stores like what you describe get lost in the growth. If the company is successful, it will know that and it will purge the lousy stores. Otherwise, they’ll implode when the interest rates go up and they can’t borrow money anymore.
- adventured 9y agoInterest rates are the last thing Dollar General needs to worry about at this point. $1.2 billion in profit on $22 billion in sales. They have $2.6 billion in long-term debt, paying ~$100m in annual interest on their total debt. They could afford a 15% interest rate on their debt. With their income, they have no need to borrow to build out stores. Their dividend is modest, so that's also no concern vs their need to spend to build.
- Spooky23 9y agoDollar General is a refinement of Ray Kroc’s McDonalds model for passive investors. Their magic is net leasing in shitty areas with barebones stores, so they don’t hold many obligations on their balance sheet, and don’t spend a lot on building upkeep and taxes. It is basically a ground lease and a bond alternative. That works because it’s an investment that lets passive investors yield 5-7%, which is a good yield from a company with a good credit rating. As rates rise, it gets less and less attractive, especially as leases start maturing, growth slows, and you need to put capital dollars into cheap buildings that you don’t own. It’s not a bad company, but it’s no Walmart.
- dogcow 9y agoLiving in the rural mid-Atlantic U.S., I've definitely seen a lot of Dollar Generals popping up all over the place. Never knew they carried groceries like meat and produce, though.
- drraid0 9y agoWho ever made that Who Shops Where in Arkansas graph needs to be castrated.
- samfriedman 9y agoI hope your severity doesn't get your comment downvoted, because I was hoping there'd be some discussion on that chart. It's trying to do a lot of things with ranking within a metric and comparing across metrics. A big problem I see is that the intervals aren't equal even for metrics with the same units. If I want to compare how far apart Family Dollar and Dollar General are in terms of customer unemployment or bachelors' percentage, well graphically it's pretty much useless. There's more spatial difference across the entire Unemployed line than there is between a (presumably) equal distance in the Bachelor's line. Even if it's only designed to allow me to rank these stores across numerous metrics, the alignment of the legend with the first row of colored points confused me for a minute: I was reading the legend not as referring to color, but to column. I'd be curious to see what Kaiser Fung at Junk Charts [0] has to say about it. [0] http://junkcharts.typepad.com/ http://junkcharts.typepad.com/
- sctb 9y agoPosting uncivilly and unsubstantively like this on Hacker News will get your account banned. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- leggomylibro 9y ago> “You rascals!” Tharp remembers telling the executive who called to deliver the news. “You come to these small towns, and you build these stores, and you cause all the mom and pops to close down, and now you’re the only ones left standing, and you want to go home? Why would you do that to our community?” "Rascals." I'm not sure I'd be so polite, if I were mayor. The cycle that Bob describes is practically rote tradition by this point, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating or audaciously malicious.
- ars 9y ago> I'm not sure I'd be so polite, if I were mayor. He was that polite because all the shops closed down before Walmart got there. The article glosses over the timeline (since it doesn't fit the narrative), but that's how it seemed to me reading between the lines. The heyday of this place was 100 years ago, by 1962 there was only 1 store left - it has not gotten better since then. As best as I can tell the Walmart opened at the location of the closed "Decatur Discount", they did not cause it (or the other stores) to close.
- Lambdanaut 9y agoI'm not sure where you're getting your information from, but the town has seen linear(albeit slow) consistent growth from 1900 to today, and has seen most of it's growth within the last 30 years.
- jessaustin 9y agoTFA itself refers to the fact that like every other agricultural community in the central and mountain timezones, the portion of the community outside city limits (i.e. most of it) has been shrinking since 1900. Don't imagine that finding town populations on wiki is some sort of revelation.
- ensignavenger 9y agoI didn't understand why he said that at all- from the article "For the first time in a decade, the 1,788 residents could buy groceries in town." So it sounds like there weren't any mom and pop shops for Walmart to "cause" to close down.
- forapurpose 9y agoI've also seen dollar stores (not Dollar General, but others) in underserved areas of major cities.
- hasbot 9y agoA Dollar General store opened this spring in my small rural town. Before it opened there was only a Ray's grocery store with a huge markup. I, and everybody with time and a car, used to drive 45+ minutes into town. I'm very price conscious and I've seen some items at DG cheaper than at Winco. Most items are about the same or only slightly higher. So now I buy perishable items (bread, ice cream, etc) at Dollar General and don't need to drive into town as often.
- megaman22 9y agoPlaces like this have always been big in rural areas. I'm from Maine, and there's two local chain stores, Reny's and Marden's that have been around for a long time, and have always been stocked with weird brands, consignment stuff, closeout items, and such, and the whole appeal is that it's cheap(er) stuff than you'd usually find, and you never quite know what you might find in stock. Plus, incredibly terrible local TV commercials Renys https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMNCjsz9ob8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMNCjsz9ob8 Marden's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZ_iM2jrLGU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZ_iM2jrLGU
- KGIII 9y agoShh! They don't need to know about Reny's. They're finally gone until skiing starts up, except for a few hunters. There's a Dollar General in Farmington and they always have cars in the parking lot. I've never been in there but they appear busy. There's another one over in the mall thing, across from Burger King. Also, Big Al's. I've been in there. They have the strangest of stuff, almost. Marden's is a bit stranger.
- megaman22 9y agoHaha, I never imagined I'd find somebody on HN that knew where Farmington was, except as the last vestiges of civilization before they hit Sugarloaf... Also home to the cheapest, and best movie theater I've ever been to. Still has $4 matinees, the last time I was up to visit my folks.
- KGIII 9y agoI know the owner of the theater. I'm up past Rangeley, in unincorporated township territory. You're the only other Mainer I've seen on HN and I'm 'from away.' Yes, I live here by choice. I retired here. I don't want to derail the thread or meander off topic.if you want, uninvolved@outlook.com will get seen and replied to.
- afarrell 9y ago
- candles12345 9y ago"Where even Wal-Mart failed" I wonder how the new info that Wal-Mart is now outpricing (cheaper) that dg will affect this?
- war1025 9y agoThe two have completely different business models. Where I grew up there is a WalMart 45 minutes away in the "city", along with Target, Best Buy, etc. etc. You go there on the weekend for your afternoon shopping trip. It's a basically weekly event, and most everyone does it. Dollar General is in town and you can go there after work if you need something. Most people I know frequent both. The difference is that WalMart requires a much larger population to support, whereas Dollar General can get by with a few (1 - 5) thousand people.
- losteverything 9y ago"If we don't have it, you don't need it." manager or w. Paris ME DG told me. DG was closest anything 17 minutes from vacation home
- Skylled 9y agoThere's just something off about products from DG, especially the ones in specially marked DG packaging. It's the same products I usually buy, but at a subtly lower quality. I always know, by taste, when cookies come from a dollar store. Duracell batteries just don't seem to last as long. Things like that.
- fpgaminer 9y agoIt's common for Walmart to convince brand name manufacturers to make "special" (aka cheaper) versions of their normal SKUs for sale at Walmart. Usually this means the product's packaging, contents, and specs stay more-or-less the same, but the general quality of the item is lower in various hard to discern dimensions (cheaper plastics, less metal parts, etc). The idea, I imagine, is to trick comparison shoppers into thinking they got a deal, when really they got exactly what they paid for. I imagine DG and other stores are doing the same thing, or at least taking advantage of the alternative SKUs. Side note: Contrast this with Costco, which does the opposite. They get manufacturers to release better versions of their normal SKUs, either higher quality, extra features, extra doodads. My last company sold an electronic product and for a brief time struck a deal with Costco to sell in a few of their stores. Normally our package just includes the product and power supply, but they asked us to also include an HDMI cable for the Costco version of the packaging, just to make things easier for customers (most customers needed an extra HDMI cable to use our product any way, but we never included one usually because our margins tended to be quite thin). So I've experienced Costco's reverse-Walmart tactic both as a customer and a supplier. It was a neat thing to learn!
- tomcam 9y agoBest Buy and Wal-Mart love to hit their customers with the HDMI cables, which clearly make up for lost margins on the printers. I often see them priced in $20 territory.
- alexasmyths 9y agoStay away from the batteries. Most other things though - you realize how badly we are getting ripped off everywhere else. Chocolate, canned things, paper. I loathe going to the 'Dollar Store' because it's so tacky, but then, I feel like a fool for buying the more expensive 'same thing' elsewhere. Here is a business plan: the 'Target' version of the 'Dollar Store'. Someone needs to make 'the cheap store' that is hip - a little focus on colour, layout. Just some thoughtfulness in terms of merchandising would go a long way.
- blizkreeg 9y agoAs an aside, it both saddens and surprises me that we don't hesitate twice when buying the cheap stuff (made abroad, of course) but also complain that all the jobs have left. It's certainly not a small town, blue-collar occupation issue but it does affect them disproportionately. This recent NYTimes piece was an eye-opening read for me in that regard. [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/14/us/union-jobs-mexico-rexnord.html?_r=1](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/14/us/union-jobs-mexico-rexnord.html?_r=1) https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/14/us/union-jobs-mexico-rexn.... Not that I didn't know this but to have it be made so vivid, it was hard to digest stuff. I'm not even sure if there's a good solution in sight. Basic income and all that is fine but people still need to be and feel productive and busy for us to stay a sane society.
- rconti 9y agoI haven't read the article, but just clicked on it -- she was featured on today's NYTimes podcast The Daily.
- rainbowmverse 9y agoIt's hard to buy better stuff when you can't find work that pays enough for it. The problem is bigger than the purchasing decisions individuals make.
- blizkreeg 9y agoPeople can't buy better stuff because they don't have jobs or jobs that pay well enough. Those jobs leaving are what helps them buy the cheaper stuff. Quite the roundabout, isn't it?
- jeirje88382hj 9y agoYeah except those jobs began to leave due to the actions of government and the elite. Let's not wrap well documented history in overly reductionist loops to sound smart. This isn't a natural economic process. It's based upon decisions made by the rich to keep getting richer. The process played out a century ago when factories left urban centers for rural. Humans go in room, come out of that room talking austerity of some kind for the masses. It's not a mystery. Economics is not physics.
- zodPod 9y agoThis is cool I was just wondering why they have opened 3 different Dollar General stores in my area! I can drive to all 3 in less than 10 minutes it's insane.
- rconti 9y agoA few thoughts: * I'm surprised you only have to be 10 miles from a Supermarket to be considered a food desert. I would get this in a populated area, but in a rural town of barely over 1000, it seems expected that you might drive a ways. Hell, in many rural areas you might drive a mile or two to even be on a main road! They do specifically mention "a rural area 10 miles.." which probably means in a city the distance to qualify as a food desert would be much smaller, which makes sense. * I wonder why they didn't bother verifying pay at the chicken plant. If the workers say they make $8.50 an hour and the employer says the minimum pay is $11.50, it seems like a quick glance at a paystub is all it would take to validate the story rather than just throw up your arms and say "well, some people disagree". Though I imagine the most likely cause is the latinos are undocumented and hence being paid under the table. * Sounds like the 20-30mi roundtrip drive to Bentonville is costly in terms of gas money (not to mention time!), but I was stunned that the employee talked about how many of the customers were in the Dollar General store 3-4 times a day (!!)
- Raidion 9y agoI know (based on a NY times article I can't quite find atm), that a lot of the labor at the factories is "contractor" style labor that's not paid as well as the full time positions. These full time positions are obviously harder to get, but do allow the company to say "minimum pay is $11.50) while in reality, they're probably paying less to a significant portion of their workforce.
- gt_ 9y agoI moved to my parent's lakehouse in rural Kentucky this Fall to study and build a software project. One of the first things I noticed is exclaimed succinctly in this headline, and they can milk this cow dry for a long time. I submit regular complaints on their websites, to help the sweet ladies who keep my local one afloat. The management would not let them use AC until mid-July.
- taivare 9y agowhen I worked for one ; top three drugstore chain, I shook my head during a loss prevention meeting when one of our managers said over 90% of the stores profits came from the cosmetics isle. It was after the 08' crash and there was a concern over theft !
- xen2xen1 9y agoInteresting article. Left my house in the middle of reading the article to go to Dollar General and get cookies. That Dollar General has been there my whole life, but only recently did we start going there regularly. It was mostly after they started selling some food, and esp. after they started selling milk and eggs at a loss. I was there 4 times in one day this weekend. We would never have done that a few years ago. They also went from one grimy store to three stores in the last five years in our small Midwestern town.
- swendoog 9y ago"Essentially what the dollar stores are betting on in a large way is that we are going to have a permanent underclass in America" I would phrase that differently. "Essentially what the dollar stores are betting on in a large way is that we are going to see an increase in the underclass in America". We've always had an underclass, it's just increasing at an unprecedented rate.
- mywittyname 9y agoLooking at the numbers: A typical Dollar General costs $250,000 to open. The average sales per square foot is $229. The store in the article is 17,000 sq ft. Dollar Generals overall profit margins are 30%. That store should have earned ~$3,900,000 in sales its first year, which is roughly $1.2 million in profits. No wonder they are expanding so fast, the profits cover the initial investment costs in as little as 3 months. That's incredible.