Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

While most comments will be negative toward Dollar General, in many areas Dollar General or Family Dollar or Dollar Tree are the only places you can get access and distribution to a wide range of products and brands in areas which are otherwise underserved.

You can dislike it, but they've evolved and expanded in part because they are very good at serving these areas profitably, where other businesses aren't.

People wanting bank branches and grocery stores and brunch spots here clearly have never lived or worked in many of these areas. The reality of theft, low spend, and employees - though not universal - is hard to fathom if you're not trying to 'run' the business. Good will does not pay your suppliers or rent.

Did you ever consider that they might have caused this situation?

I have overall had good experiences with Dollar General, but mis-pricing items like this is completely unacceptable. This article is very damaging to their brand to me. Even though I haven't experienced it myself.

It would help people to consider your point if you made even a modest attempt to explain and justify what you mean.

My point is not to explain how they caused it, its to point out that the commenter didn’t even mention the existence of that possibility

Dollar General and their ilk are behemoths compared to the shops that might have served these areas before they rolled in. It's possible they're the only game in town because they engaged in dumping or other dirty/illegal tactics to drive out established businesses.

I'm not an expert on the topic, but I don't think it's a reach to think that they might have engineered this situation.

It's possible, just unlikely.

The reality is a small business owner does not have the time or wherewithal to negotiate large contracts across hundreds or thousands of brands. They may nail SKU's and quantities better than a Wal-Mart or Dollar General, but at the price of higher costs and lower selection.

You don't really see large scale backlash in communities against these stores for this reason - buying branded at a reasonable price point is foundational for a good quality of life in modern society.

Most people vote with their feet, and are happy with the tradeoff.

Keep in mind this happens in all industries to varying degrees and causes.

I once worked as a cashier at “The Fresh Market” chain, a higher end, higher income store. We had this issue all day every day. I couldn’t go a shift without having to call over the manager for two or three price corrections. The root-cause was our incompetent stoner stock-boy would leave up discounted sale signs up for days and even weeks after the time had passed. Despite his bad work ethic he worked there for years because help was just that hard to come by. Nothing ultimately malicious by corporate but the end result looks suspicious as can be.

Or perhaps more likely like a large corporation simply has economies of scale that smaller retailers cannot compete with.

I understand that- the key is "varying degrees". This article documents several cases across multiple states that go well beyond reasonable. I've learned to be careful to look at the dates on sale tags.

Another thing many grocery chains do is list a price that is only for folks who sign up for the stores tracking program, rather than the price that folk who don't want to jump through whoops and sing the song and dance pay. (They put that price in the fine print).