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I don't think that people in this thread appreciate how prevalent grocery shopping in dollar stores is. In the US, half of shoppers buy groceries from a dollar

I don't think that people in this thread appreciate how prevalent grocery shopping in dollar stores is. In the US, half of shoppers buy groceries from a dollar store. They do it because it's literally all they can afford anything else. There are more dollar stores than Walmart, Starbucks and McDonald’s combined. "Kyle Dishman can’t afford to shop at the local grocery store anymore. Instead he goes to Dollar General, where he can make $40 stretch into a week’s worth of groceries and the occasional can of motor oil for his Chrysler 300." Sources: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/08/20/growing-number-americans-are-relying-dollar-stores/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/08/20/growing-n... https://www.mashed.com/224027/think-twice-before-buying-food-at-dollar-general/ https://www.mashed.com/224027/think-twice-before-buying-food... EDIT: Of course not all things cost $1, but it's certainly weighted in that direction. You don't go to a dollar store for nice things; you do it because it's the only option for you. A lot of the responses seem to want to debate how poor people are making choices, and I think that misses the point.

selimthegrim 5y ago
Isn't that the motor oil that's not rated for cars after the mid-80s or something?
- kube-system 5y ago
  Dollar Tree motor oil is API SN rated. It is basic oil that will work in many basic late model vehicles.
- Jach 5y ago
  It was probably thrown in to give a sense of the variety available, but just about every grocery store or even gas station has cheap motor oil available. It's not like you need very much of it very often. It's just a bad article with bad quotes. I'm sure a huge number of people on HN remember weeks as a poor student and having to hack $10 to last a week or more. $40 a week, that's a luxury!
  - fortran77 5y ago
    > It's not like you need very much of it very often You never drove an old hooptie, like I did in my early years!
    - throwaway946513 5y ago
      Oh, how I am reminded that I need to add yet another quart of oil into my Isuzu for the next two weeks.
      - selimthegrim 5y ago
        So that’s how you keep it from rolling over.
NotQuitePls 5y ago
Whenever an article says cheap food is bad, just close it. You can get a loaf of whole wheat bread for $1, or you can buy a TV dinner for $1. Efficiency Is Everything website has researched this. This is a low information problem, not a capitalism problem.
tantalor 5y ago
Dollar General is not a "dollar store" > Even though Dollar General has the word “dollar” in its name, everything in the store doesn’t go for a buck; their merchandise is just low priced. https://www.rd.com/article/dollar-tree-vs-dollar-general/ https://www.rd.com/article/dollar-tree-vs-dollar-general/
dragonwriter 5y ago
> They do it because it’s literally all they can afford anything else. Dollar stores very often aren’t cheaper than other sources for similar products especially for grocery items (which they tend to have very limited selections of.) People that shop for groceries at dollar stores do it because: 1. They shop for other things at dollar stores (either for price, or for reason #2, or because its the only place close by that carries the type of thing involved) and getting groceries there saves a trip, 2. Reputation for price without actual comparison, 3. Lack of actual grocery stores conveniently located, Your own second article notes the relatively high prices (as well as quality issues) of dollar store groceries.
- Osiris 5y ago
  This is my experience with Dollar General when on trips and stopping for cheap snacks. Only the no brand generic items are cheap. Name brand items are not. Dollar Tree, on the other hand, every item is a dollar and it's possible to get cheap cereal and other groceries but many small things like candy are more expensive.
- tsol 5y ago
  >Dollar stores very often aren’t cheaper than other sources for similar products especially for grocery items (which they tend to have very limited selections of.) Some products are. Especially the unhealthy-- candy and soda is cheaper. I used to get bread there, they'd have the same bread as nicer stores just closer to the 'best by' date. But it tasted fine to me. I would get dishes and cups, silverware, and socks. Are ended up being cheaper than even Walmart. It can be cost effective even if you have other options
  - vianneychevalie 5y ago
    How often do you need to buy dishes, cups and socks?
    - heartbreak 5y ago
      "Buy once cry once" only works when you have money. If all you can afford are dollar store socks, you're going to be buying a lot of dollar store socks. Being poor sucks.
tantalor 5y ago
That quote is absurd. A Chrysler 300 is a luxury car.
- thisisnico 5y ago
  Not necessarily, let's say it's a 2008, you can easily find 300 junkers now worth almost nothing.
  - boppo1 5y ago
    Are these any good? I might need a car on the cheap soon.
    - kube-system 5y ago
      It depends on what your criteria for "any good" are. Most cars that have depreciated rapidly do so because their maintenance burden is high. If you think you have a better-than-average ability to absorb or mitigate this risk, then it might be a wise purchase. If you cannot, it is probably an unwise purchase.
    - HeyLaughingBoy 5y ago
      If you're mechanically inclined and have a place to do the work, pretty much any old American (due to parts availability) car is "good enough." Buying your own tools is almost always far less expensive than going to a mechanic. Time is the real cost! It's easier now than it has been to learn how to keep cars running.
- sologoub 5y ago
  Chrysler 300s have been on the road for a long time. Just because new one is in the $35k range doesn’t mean that one from 10-15 years ago is that expensive. Chryslers also generally depreciate faster than say a Toyota Camry or Corolla.
- function_seven 5y ago
  Eh. I mean, I know it wants to be one. And brand new I'm sure they're nice. But most 300s I see around me are old beaters you can buy (even now) for less than $6k. [0] And if someone needs an occasional quart of oil for their car, it's likely got some miles on it. It's not some pricey luxury automobile anymore. It's just an old Chrysler. [0] https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtml?listingId=614388704 https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtm...
bluedino 5y ago
If you want to save money on groceries you should be going to Aldi or Sav a Lot, not Dollar stores. Their products are terrible (mostly house brands) and prices aren't even good.
- selimthegrim 5y ago
  Save a Lot's packaging and bags are extremely poor quality. Try dropping one of their yogurt containers (when it's not past its expiry date or moldy before that) or walking a distance with one of their paper bags.
- Osiris 5y ago
  The first model of the recent generation was 2005, so it could be a 16 year old car. A quick check on Autotrader shows these cars selling for about $6500.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  Neither of those are in rural areas. Heck, people I know in urban areas are still excited when the Aldi's come to town.
  - Auracle 5y ago
    There’s one in the town of 20,000 next to me (15 minutes away) along with two other grocery stores and a Walmart. There’s nothing in my town of 2,000 of course, though I believe there’s a Dollar-Something in another local town.
    - HWR_14 5y ago
      I mean, nexuses of grocery stores exist in rural areas. But 15 minutes is pretty close for such a town. 5% of rural people live in a food desert. Meanwhile you probably live in Ohio or Illinois, because if you look at the Aldi map, that seems to be where most rural Aldis are. (WI and FL are the next guesses.) But, with three exceptions in NM and a bunch in Cali, there are no Aldis west of Dallas. That's a huge area.
jodrellblank 5y ago
His Chrysler 300? This thing Wikipedia describes as a V8 powered “full-size luxury car”? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysler_300 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysler_300
- lost-found 5y ago
  In no world is a Chrysler 300 a luxury car.
  - kube-system 5y ago
    It isn't a good luxury car, but it objectively is one. "Luxury car" is a description of market segment, not a measure of quality.
- function_seven 5y ago
  Probably more like a cheap V6 leaking or burning oil. Something like this [0] (Not that I'm accusing that specific one, but I wouldn't bet against it either) [0] https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtml?listingId=614388704 https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtm...
- elliekelly 5y ago
  My first car was a luxury car... fifteen years before I bought it. I like to think I got a good deal thanks to the ugly tomato red interior.
- worstestes 5y ago
  These are a dime a dozen on the used market.. Could easily be one from the mid 2000s. Literally 1-3k for a 2005-08 (condition varies of course)
- kevinob11 5y ago
  In my experience it is incredibly common for people without much money to have cars that seem impractical, because they are easy to buy but hard to maintain. I think this is pretty common with cars that were very popular when they were first released (the 300 was) so the market is saturated with old ones in rough condition that are cheap to purchase but terrible to maintain. Sample size of 1, but my roommate in college (I was in college, he was not) went through 3 cars in the amount of time I had just 1 because he only ever had enough money to buy a crappy car and had terrible credit. They all broke down pretty quickly so he ended up spending more in the long-run, but in the end he had to get to work, so he did what he had to do.
pessimizer 5y ago
Also, a lot of places that don't have a local grocery store do have a dollar store. You can make $40 into a pretty luxurious week of food at Aldi if you know how to cook, and a perfectly fine week of food if you don't. The problem is when the nearest Aldi is miles away, or you don't drive.
xapata 5y ago
> afford Afford is an elusive concept. Dollar stores are often more expensive per-unit, but cheaper per-package. If the shoppers had better access to financing, some might choose to take a longer trip to, say, Costco, and buy things at a cheaper per-unit price in a more expensive package.
- throwaway946513 5y ago
  Pretty sure the idea of financing groceries, or common daily/weekly expendables isn't a very good one.
  - brewdad 5y ago
    Why do you think payday loan shops exist?
    - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
      Primarily to pay government fines and auto repair bills. Nobody is getting a payday loan to buy groceries. They're doing it to stave off things that if ignored will cause them to lose their income and slide further into poverty. They're poor, not stupid.
      - imtringued 5y ago
        Actually the most common reason is to pay rent because you can't bill that on a credit cart.
  - xapata 5y ago
    Depends on the price, of course. Compare the per-unit prices, your warehousing costs, and the interest rate on the loan.
Jach 5y ago
Just because a store has 'dollar' in its name doesn't mean it's a dollar store. Dollar General in particular is not the kind of store where all or even most things are a dollar, which was the traditional meaning of 'dollar store'. At least your own source notes this: "And despite their names, many dollar chains, including Family Dollar and Dollar General, sell items that cost $10 or more. Dollar Tree remains the only major retailer that continues to price its entire inventory for $1." I shopped at a couple Dollar Generals on a road trip this past summer (it was interesting to see how many towns we passed through had one, as opposed to some other brand) and it seemed to me like a scaled down Fred Meyer, or a super scaled down Walmart. Maybe a scaled up gas station? And that's fine for most people, as evidenced by their market success. They tend to stock the same popular stuff as a bigger grocery store would. But you're not magically going to pay $1 for your full sized frozen pizza just because of the name. Indeed I can see an ad advertising two-for-$8 Tombstone pizzas, which is about the same as routine sales at my local Safeway in the rich Seattle area. (And an edit for your edit, you're vaguely complaining that something is wrong for the subset of people where such stores are the only option, as if shipping and delivery don't exist, but whatever, you want them to have no options? I know you probably don't but it'd be more constructive to articulate what you actually want.)
jandrese 5y ago
The big problem with this is that Dollar Stores generally don't have a produce section. Everything is in a box, bag, or can. This is not healthy. $40/week for a single person isn't an easy food budget, but I think could manage that at my grocery store. It's $5.71 per day for three meals. You really need to optimize for calories. Pasta, dried beans, potatoes, not much meat or dairy, even produce is a bit of a luxury. This is the kind of budget that puts those "just drink one less Starbucks coffee a day" comments into perspective. And forget about eating out, even a single fast food meal would blow your entire budget for the day. This becomes a very serious challenge if he's trying to feed a family of 4 on that budget.
- jaywalk 5y ago
  > $40/week for a single person isn't an easy food budget What? One person can easily get by on $40/week for food.
  - jandrese 5y ago
    Start working it out at your grocery store. It's not as easy as it looks. I'm not saying it is impossible, far from it, but you do have to be conscious of every single purchase. That head of broccoli is $2 this week? Maybe not in the budget. Apples are up to $1/each again, those are right out. These aren't crazy organic prices either, this is regular produce and store brands. This goes double if you're trying to eat a healthy balanced diet and not going for a college kid ramen diet. Even worse with a budget so small it is hard to take advantage of buying in bulk to save money. Buy a 50lb sack of potatoes and you can't afford to each much of anything else for the week. Buying flour to make bread is a great cost saver when you are buying in 40lb bags, but not so great in the 5lb bags with the markup.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- WastingMyTime89 5y ago
  Completely off topic but as someone who had to do something equivalent in an European country you can eat well for less than 40$ a week if you know how to cook. Buying a whole chicken is far less expensive that buying cuts and is a cheap source of meat. You can make good stock from the bones. Vegetables at the end of their shelf life are often substantially marked down and you can often freeze what you cook with them (sauce and curry for exemple). Rice is very cheap, polenta too. Fresh pasta are easy to make and delicious as are homemade tortillas. Eggs are only 16c a piece. Fresh garlic and ginger are not too expensive and with a small selection of spices and soy sauce they will go a long way in making things better. Then, you can somewhat easily grow basil, parsley, thymes and cilantro on a window sill. Olive oil and butter were the only expensive product I used to buy but a little goes a long way.
wly_cdgr 5y ago
A 50lb bag of white rice can be had on Amazon for $88, which translates into roughly 1k calories/$1 delivered to your doorstep for free in two-three days. You can get similar calorie/$ value with pasta, peanut butter, oatmeal. No one who has $40/week to spend on food in America needs to go anywhere close to hungry if they don't waste their money and time driving to dollar stores to buy overpriced non-bulk groceries. You Americans can't afford frozen pizza and think that means you're suffering
- californical 5y ago
  If someone only has $40 for groceries, how will they be able to come up with $88 for just plain rice? The answer is that they can’t get those same discounts buying larger scale items. I agree there are still some cases where people may spend irresponsibly, but it’s a different problem than “cheaper calories exist in large enough quantities”
- mmastrac 5y ago
  Ok, so you now need: A credit card + bank account A stable address and room to store bulk stuff A place to get packages where they won't be stolen $88
  - refurb 5y ago
    You’re talking homeless which is a subset of poor. Whenever someone says “the poor can do this” someone comes along to give an example of poor people who can’t. We get it, but there are plenty of poor who can do those things.
  - Mountain_Skies 5y ago
    You can add cash to your Amazon account at AllPoint ATMs, CVS, Walgreens, RiteAid, GameStop, 7-11 and many other stores.
  - tehwebguy 5y ago
    That price is not even cheap, grocery stores have rice at a much lower unit price in much smaller packages. Dollar store rice is likely in between them and still a very solid calorie deal. There is still a requirement that one has time, equipment & energy to cook with, though.
KorematsuFredt 5y ago
"In the US, half of shoppers buy groceries from a dollar store." I do not think it means half of Americans buy groceries from dollar general. I do not think it means of all those who shop groceries, half of them buy it from dollar general. I think it means, half of the people who buy stuff at dollar store also buy some groceries there. It does not mean much when put it that way. I am familiar with poor people's shopping habits. The biggest advantage that Dollar stores have over others is not the price but rather their convenient location. A lot of Indians/Chinese students who come on shoestring budget would often buy lot of junk food from dollar store because they did not own car. For other items such as rice etc. they would request me to buy a large bag for them and then divide it among themselves. Similarly, trip to walmart etc. were rationed mostly because they did not own cars. People who owned cars on other hand could stretch their budgets even more. It was not uncommon for 5 of the folks to share one car, share a costco membership and buy in bulk and save lot of money in the process.
rsj_hn 5y ago
> In the US, half of shoppers buy groceries from a dollar store. I think you are misreading the (ambiguous) mashed.com text, "More than half of shoppers now visit dollar stores to buy groceries, eMarketer reports, up from 21 percent just a few years ago.". It does not mean that more than half of all grocery shoppers buy their groceries at dollar stores, but that more than half of dollar store shoppers are shopping at the dollar store to buy groceries. Actual market share of dollar stores in the grocery business is 2.9%, but this is expected to increase to 3.2% https://www.supermarketnews.com/issues-trends/will-supermarkets-grocery-market-share-lead-be-short-lived https://www.supermarketnews.com/issues-trends/will-supermark...
generalizations 5y ago
That's the significance of Dollar Tree making this announcement - they are the dollar store chain that does actually price everything at $1.
kube-system 5y ago
There are other reasons that people buy from dollar stores. I occasionally buy a few things at Dollar Tree when I want a smaller portion sizes for some basic goods. I also just like going when I'm in the mood to impulse buy stuff for hobbies etc. Dollar General, on the other hand, has notoriously positioned itself in underserved areas. While it's true that many of these areas are underserved because they are low-income areas, that's not necessarily the case. In semi-rural areas, Dollar General is often the closest general goods store, and people of all income levels will go there.
ingenieros 5y ago
hear hear
rudolph9 5y ago
I don’t think you appreciate that everything at “Dollar Tree” actually costs a dollar or at leas did.
- tamaharbor 5y ago
  They have a higher priced section now. Not everything is $1 at Dollar Tree any more. At least here in Colorado.
raydev 5y ago
> grocery shopping in dollar stores > Dollar General Dollar General has never been a "dollar store" in the way you're thinking.
refurb 5y ago
Maybe HN is richer than I thought, but I shop at Dollar Stores all the time and have a very good paying job. And I’m not alone, it’s not just poor people who shop there (go to the one in Daly City and see the clientele). This thread comes across as incredibly out of touch. It’s like a bunch of upper middle class who imagine themselves lower middle class and anyone who shops at Walmart (yuck!) or Dollar Store must be destitute. Despite those stores being pretty average places to shop for most Americans. You can get killer deals there. They tend to sell two different things:1) excess stock they got cheap and sell cheap and 2) normally high margin items for less. Their health section is amazing compared to say CVS or Walgreens. We’re talking 80% cheaper for the same thing. Not everything is cheaper but a lot of it is.
ricardobayes 5y ago
Are they selling the same goods as walmart/target etc. or have their own branded goods?

selimthegrim 5y ago

Isn't that the motor oil that's not rated for cars after the mid-80s or something?

kube-system 5y ago
Dollar Tree motor oil is API SN rated. It is basic oil that will work in many basic late model vehicles.
Jach 5y ago
It was probably thrown in to give a sense of the variety available, but just about every grocery store or even gas station has cheap motor oil available. It's not like you need very much of it very often. It's just a bad article with bad quotes. I'm sure a huge number of people on HN remember weeks as a poor student and having to hack $10 to last a week or more. $40 a week, that's a luxury!
- fortran77 5y ago
  > It's not like you need very much of it very often You never drove an old hooptie, like I did in my early years!
  - throwaway946513 5y ago
    Oh, how I am reminded that I need to add yet another quart of oil into my Isuzu for the next two weeks.
    - selimthegrim 5y ago
      So that’s how you keep it from rolling over.

NotQuitePls 5y ago

Whenever an article says cheap food is bad, just close it. You can get a loaf of whole wheat bread for $1, or you can buy a TV dinner for $1. Efficiency Is Everything website has researched this. This is a low information problem, not a capitalism problem.

tantalor 5y ago

Dollar General is not a "dollar store" > Even though Dollar General has the word “dollar” in its name, everything in the store doesn’t go for a buck; their merchandise is just low priced. https://www.rd.com/article/dollar-tree-vs-dollar-general/ https://www.rd.com/article/dollar-tree-vs-dollar-general/

dragonwriter 5y ago

> They do it because it’s literally all they can afford anything else. Dollar stores very often aren’t cheaper than other sources for similar products especially for grocery items (which they tend to have very limited selections of.) People that shop for groceries at dollar stores do it because: 1. They shop for other things at dollar stores (either for price, or for reason #2, or because its the only place close by that carries the type of thing involved) and getting groceries there saves a trip, 2. Reputation for price without actual comparison, 3. Lack of actual grocery stores conveniently located, Your own second article notes the relatively high prices (as well as quality issues) of dollar store groceries.

Osiris 5y ago
This is my experience with Dollar General when on trips and stopping for cheap snacks. Only the no brand generic items are cheap. Name brand items are not. Dollar Tree, on the other hand, every item is a dollar and it's possible to get cheap cereal and other groceries but many small things like candy are more expensive.
tsol 5y ago
>Dollar stores very often aren’t cheaper than other sources for similar products especially for grocery items (which they tend to have very limited selections of.) Some products are. Especially the unhealthy-- candy and soda is cheaper. I used to get bread there, they'd have the same bread as nicer stores just closer to the 'best by' date. But it tasted fine to me. I would get dishes and cups, silverware, and socks. Are ended up being cheaper than even Walmart. It can be cost effective even if you have other options
- vianneychevalie 5y ago
  How often do you need to buy dishes, cups and socks?
  - heartbreak 5y ago
    "Buy once cry once" only works when you have money. If all you can afford are dollar store socks, you're going to be buying a lot of dollar store socks. Being poor sucks.

tantalor 5y ago

That quote is absurd. A Chrysler 300 is a luxury car.

thisisnico 5y ago
Not necessarily, let's say it's a 2008, you can easily find 300 junkers now worth almost nothing.
- boppo1 5y ago
  Are these any good? I might need a car on the cheap soon.
  - kube-system 5y ago
    It depends on what your criteria for "any good" are. Most cars that have depreciated rapidly do so because their maintenance burden is high. If you think you have a better-than-average ability to absorb or mitigate this risk, then it might be a wise purchase. If you cannot, it is probably an unwise purchase.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 5y ago
    If you're mechanically inclined and have a place to do the work, pretty much any old American (due to parts availability) car is "good enough." Buying your own tools is almost always far less expensive than going to a mechanic. Time is the real cost! It's easier now than it has been to learn how to keep cars running.
sologoub 5y ago
Chrysler 300s have been on the road for a long time. Just because new one is in the $35k range doesn’t mean that one from 10-15 years ago is that expensive. Chryslers also generally depreciate faster than say a Toyota Camry or Corolla.
function_seven 5y ago
Eh. I mean, I know it wants to be one. And brand new I'm sure they're nice. But most 300s I see around me are old beaters you can buy (even now) for less than $6k. [0] And if someone needs an occasional quart of oil for their car, it's likely got some miles on it. It's not some pricey luxury automobile anymore. It's just an old Chrysler. [0] https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtml?listingId=614388704 https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtm...

bluedino 5y ago

If you want to save money on groceries you should be going to Aldi or Sav a Lot, not Dollar stores. Their products are terrible (mostly house brands) and prices aren't even good.

selimthegrim 5y ago
Save a Lot's packaging and bags are extremely poor quality. Try dropping one of their yogurt containers (when it's not past its expiry date or moldy before that) or walking a distance with one of their paper bags.
Osiris 5y ago
The first model of the recent generation was 2005, so it could be a 16 year old car. A quick check on Autotrader shows these cars selling for about $6500.
HWR_14 5y ago
Neither of those are in rural areas. Heck, people I know in urban areas are still excited when the Aldi's come to town.
- Auracle 5y ago
  There’s one in the town of 20,000 next to me (15 minutes away) along with two other grocery stores and a Walmart. There’s nothing in my town of 2,000 of course, though I believe there’s a Dollar-Something in another local town.
  - HWR_14 5y ago
    I mean, nexuses of grocery stores exist in rural areas. But 15 minutes is pretty close for such a town. 5% of rural people live in a food desert. Meanwhile you probably live in Ohio or Illinois, because if you look at the Aldi map, that seems to be where most rural Aldis are. (WI and FL are the next guesses.) But, with three exceptions in NM and a bunch in Cali, there are no Aldis west of Dallas. That's a huge area.

jodrellblank 5y ago

His Chrysler 300? This thing Wikipedia describes as a V8 powered “full-size luxury car”? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysler_300 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysler_300

lost-found 5y ago
In no world is a Chrysler 300 a luxury car.
- kube-system 5y ago
  It isn't a good luxury car, but it objectively is one. "Luxury car" is a description of market segment, not a measure of quality.
function_seven 5y ago
Probably more like a cheap V6 leaking or burning oil. Something like this [0] (Not that I'm accusing that specific one, but I wouldn't bet against it either) [0] https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtml?listingId=614388704 https://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtm...
elliekelly 5y ago
My first car was a luxury car... fifteen years before I bought it. I like to think I got a good deal thanks to the ugly tomato red interior.
worstestes 5y ago
These are a dime a dozen on the used market.. Could easily be one from the mid 2000s. Literally 1-3k for a 2005-08 (condition varies of course)
kevinob11 5y ago
In my experience it is incredibly common for people without much money to have cars that seem impractical, because they are easy to buy but hard to maintain. I think this is pretty common with cars that were very popular when they were first released (the 300 was) so the market is saturated with old ones in rough condition that are cheap to purchase but terrible to maintain. Sample size of 1, but my roommate in college (I was in college, he was not) went through 3 cars in the amount of time I had just 1 because he only ever had enough money to buy a crappy car and had terrible credit. They all broke down pretty quickly so he ended up spending more in the long-run, but in the end he had to get to work, so he did what he had to do.

pessimizer 5y ago

Also, a lot of places that don't have a local grocery store do have a dollar store. You can make $40 into a pretty luxurious week of food at Aldi if you know how to cook, and a perfectly fine week of food if you don't. The problem is when the nearest Aldi is miles away, or you don't drive.

xapata 5y ago

> afford Afford is an elusive concept. Dollar stores are often more expensive per-unit, but cheaper per-package. If the shoppers had better access to financing, some might choose to take a longer trip to, say, Costco, and buy things at a cheaper per-unit price in a more expensive package.

throwaway946513 5y ago
Pretty sure the idea of financing groceries, or common daily/weekly expendables isn't a very good one.
- brewdad 5y ago
  Why do you think payday loan shops exist?
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    Primarily to pay government fines and auto repair bills. Nobody is getting a payday loan to buy groceries. They're doing it to stave off things that if ignored will cause them to lose their income and slide further into poverty. They're poor, not stupid.
    - imtringued 5y ago
      Actually the most common reason is to pay rent because you can't bill that on a credit cart.
- xapata 5y ago
  Depends on the price, of course. Compare the per-unit prices, your warehousing costs, and the interest rate on the loan.

Jach 5y ago

Just because a store has 'dollar' in its name doesn't mean it's a dollar store. Dollar General in particular is not the kind of store where all or even most things are a dollar, which was the traditional meaning of 'dollar store'. At least your own source notes this: "And despite their names, many dollar chains, including Family Dollar and Dollar General, sell items that cost $10 or more. Dollar Tree remains the only major retailer that continues to price its entire inventory for $1." I shopped at a couple Dollar Generals on a road trip this past summer (it was interesting to see how many towns we passed through had one, as opposed to some other brand) and it seemed to me like a scaled down Fred Meyer, or a super scaled down Walmart. Maybe a scaled up gas station? And that's fine for most people, as evidenced by their market success. They tend to stock the same popular stuff as a bigger grocery store would. But you're not magically going to pay $1 for your full sized frozen pizza just because of the name. Indeed I can see an ad advertising two-for-$8 Tombstone pizzas, which is about the same as routine sales at my local Safeway in the rich Seattle area. (And an edit for your edit, you're vaguely complaining that something is wrong for the subset of people where such stores are the only option, as if shipping and delivery don't exist, but whatever, you want them to have no options? I know you probably don't but it'd be more constructive to articulate what you actually want.)

jandrese 5y ago

The big problem with this is that Dollar Stores generally don't have a produce section. Everything is in a box, bag, or can. This is not healthy. $40/week for a single person isn't an easy food budget, but I think could manage that at my grocery store. It's $5.71 per day for three meals. You really need to optimize for calories. Pasta, dried beans, potatoes, not much meat or dairy, even produce is a bit of a luxury. This is the kind of budget that puts those "just drink one less Starbucks coffee a day" comments into perspective. And forget about eating out, even a single fast food meal would blow your entire budget for the day. This becomes a very serious challenge if he's trying to feed a family of 4 on that budget.

jaywalk 5y ago
> $40/week for a single person isn't an easy food budget What? One person can easily get by on $40/week for food.
- jandrese 5y ago
  Start working it out at your grocery store. It's not as easy as it looks. I'm not saying it is impossible, far from it, but you do have to be conscious of every single purchase. That head of broccoli is $2 this week? Maybe not in the budget. Apples are up to $1/each again, those are right out. These aren't crazy organic prices either, this is regular produce and store brands. This goes double if you're trying to eat a healthy balanced diet and not going for a college kid ramen diet. Even worse with a budget so small it is hard to take advantage of buying in bulk to save money. Buy a 50lb sack of potatoes and you can't afford to each much of anything else for the week. Buying flour to make bread is a great cost saver when you are buying in 40lb bags, but not so great in the 5lb bags with the markup.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
WastingMyTime89 5y ago
Completely off topic but as someone who had to do something equivalent in an European country you can eat well for less than 40$ a week if you know how to cook. Buying a whole chicken is far less expensive that buying cuts and is a cheap source of meat. You can make good stock from the bones. Vegetables at the end of their shelf life are often substantially marked down and you can often freeze what you cook with them (sauce and curry for exemple). Rice is very cheap, polenta too. Fresh pasta are easy to make and delicious as are homemade tortillas. Eggs are only 16c a piece. Fresh garlic and ginger are not too expensive and with a small selection of spices and soy sauce they will go a long way in making things better. Then, you can somewhat easily grow basil, parsley, thymes and cilantro on a window sill. Olive oil and butter were the only expensive product I used to buy but a little goes a long way.

wly_cdgr 5y ago

A 50lb bag of white rice can be had on Amazon for $88, which translates into roughly 1k calories/$1 delivered to your doorstep for free in two-three days. You can get similar calorie/$ value with pasta, peanut butter, oatmeal. No one who has $40/week to spend on food in America needs to go anywhere close to hungry if they don't waste their money and time driving to dollar stores to buy overpriced non-bulk groceries. You Americans can't afford frozen pizza and think that means you're suffering

californical 5y ago
If someone only has $40 for groceries, how will they be able to come up with $88 for just plain rice? The answer is that they can’t get those same discounts buying larger scale items. I agree there are still some cases where people may spend irresponsibly, but it’s a different problem than “cheaper calories exist in large enough quantities”
mmastrac 5y ago
Ok, so you now need: A credit card + bank account A stable address and room to store bulk stuff A place to get packages where they won't be stolen $88
- refurb 5y ago
  You’re talking homeless which is a subset of poor. Whenever someone says “the poor can do this” someone comes along to give an example of poor people who can’t. We get it, but there are plenty of poor who can do those things.
- Mountain_Skies 5y ago
  You can add cash to your Amazon account at AllPoint ATMs, CVS, Walgreens, RiteAid, GameStop, 7-11 and many other stores.
- tehwebguy 5y ago
  That price is not even cheap, grocery stores have rice at a much lower unit price in much smaller packages. Dollar store rice is likely in between them and still a very solid calorie deal. There is still a requirement that one has time, equipment & energy to cook with, though.

KorematsuFredt 5y ago

"In the US, half of shoppers buy groceries from a dollar store." I do not think it means half of Americans buy groceries from dollar general. I do not think it means of all those who shop groceries, half of them buy it from dollar general. I think it means, half of the people who buy stuff at dollar store also buy some groceries there. It does not mean much when put it that way. I am familiar with poor people's shopping habits. The biggest advantage that Dollar stores have over others is not the price but rather their convenient location. A lot of Indians/Chinese students who come on shoestring budget would often buy lot of junk food from dollar store because they did not own car. For other items such as rice etc. they would request me to buy a large bag for them and then divide it among themselves. Similarly, trip to walmart etc. were rationed mostly because they did not own cars. People who owned cars on other hand could stretch their budgets even more. It was not uncommon for 5 of the folks to share one car, share a costco membership and buy in bulk and save lot of money in the process.

rsj_hn 5y ago

> In the US, half of shoppers buy groceries from a dollar store. I think you are misreading the (ambiguous) mashed.com text, "More than half of shoppers now visit dollar stores to buy groceries, eMarketer reports, up from 21 percent just a few years ago.". It does not mean that more than half of all grocery shoppers buy their groceries at dollar stores, but that more than half of dollar store shoppers are shopping at the dollar store to buy groceries. Actual market share of dollar stores in the grocery business is 2.9%, but this is expected to increase to 3.2% https://www.supermarketnews.com/issues-trends/will-supermarkets-grocery-market-share-lead-be-short-lived https://www.supermarketnews.com/issues-trends/will-supermark...

generalizations 5y ago

That's the significance of Dollar Tree making this announcement - they are the dollar store chain that does actually price everything at $1.

kube-system 5y ago

There are other reasons that people buy from dollar stores. I occasionally buy a few things at Dollar Tree when I want a smaller portion sizes for some basic goods. I also just like going when I'm in the mood to impulse buy stuff for hobbies etc. Dollar General, on the other hand, has notoriously positioned itself in underserved areas. While it's true that many of these areas are underserved because they are low-income areas, that's not necessarily the case. In semi-rural areas, Dollar General is often the closest general goods store, and people of all income levels will go there.

ingenieros 5y ago

hear hear

rudolph9 5y ago

I don’t think you appreciate that everything at “Dollar Tree” actually costs a dollar or at leas did.

tamaharbor 5y ago
They have a higher priced section now. Not everything is $1 at Dollar Tree any more. At least here in Colorado.

raydev 5y ago

> grocery shopping in dollar stores > Dollar General Dollar General has never been a "dollar store" in the way you're thinking.

refurb 5y ago

Maybe HN is richer than I thought, but I shop at Dollar Stores all the time and have a very good paying job. And I’m not alone, it’s not just poor people who shop there (go to the one in Daly City and see the clientele). This thread comes across as incredibly out of touch. It’s like a bunch of upper middle class who imagine themselves lower middle class and anyone who shops at Walmart (yuck!) or Dollar Store must be destitute. Despite those stores being pretty average places to shop for most Americans. You can get killer deals there. They tend to sell two different things:1) excess stock they got cheap and sell cheap and 2) normally high margin items for less. Their health section is amazing compared to say CVS or Walgreens. We’re talking 80% cheaper for the same thing. Not everything is cheaper but a lot of it is.

ricardobayes 5y ago

Are they selling the same goods as walmart/target etc. or have their own branded goods?