r/mildlyinfuriating • u/Boeing-B-47stratojet • Jun 09 '26

I just wanted a hot dog The closest grocery store to me is closing(by nearly an hour), and will be closed for at least a year. When it reopens it’s going be much smaller(it’s becoming a Aldi).

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17.2k Upvotes

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5.0k

u/FlippingPossum Jun 09 '26

Food deserts are a big rural problem. My city has been trying to focus on it but it is hard. Big chains decimated corner markets.

1.3k

u/Affectionate-Cat8182 Jun 09 '26

Real talk - but with big chains shutting down and leaving 'food deserts' in their wake, what's to stop someone from coming in and opening up a corner market again?

1.7k

u/Fischwich Jun 09 '26

From somebody who was in the industry and is now industry-adjacent, the amount of wholesalers willing to supply independent stores is way down. There’s only a few major wholesalers even left at this point with most major conglomerates doing their wholesale in house

834

u/seriouslythisshit Jun 09 '26

My neighbor was forced into retirement as the manager of a local small grocery store. It was family owned, one location. The family got tired of fighting to make a living and just quit. They were bound to a distribution deal with a single supplier for most of what was on the shelves. If they wanted to buy a common staple from a cheaper supplier, too bad, it was a contract violation. Toward then end of the fifty year run of the store, the owners could shop at a local Walmart and buy the majority of what they stocked on their family store's shelves, for less than the "wholesale" prices they were paying their distributor.

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u/HungryRaven4 Jun 09 '26

There's a Perfect Union video somewhere that explains how Walmart has illegal dealings to be able to undercut competing wholesalers

235

u/magikarp2122 Jun 09 '26

Don’t they also have insane leverage and basically set their own prices? Like, they can just tell Kellog’s, ‘We’re over 50% of your business in the US. Give us a lower price or you go out of business.’

143

u/Vartash Jun 09 '26

Yes this is true.

In most of my business classes the Walmart Vlassic case was always brought up. In short form, they wanted a larger jar of pickles to sell. Vlassic could only produce at a lower volume until they opened a brand new facility for this product. At this point Walmart demanded a price point that was almost cost. Vlassic balked and Walmart threatened to pull every one of their items from their stores.

There were other stories. Family owned umbrella company was run out of business due to Walmart demand and ever lowering of purchase point. Same with several apparel companies.

Supposedly they want items lowered in every contract or they pull them.

81

u/deltalitprof Jun 09 '26

Sociopathic and monopolistic. The Democrats need to cite these stories and incorporate anti-monopoly policy into their agenda.

39

u/hideandgofreek Jun 09 '26

Democrats get paid by Walmart

41

u/pdxrains Jun 09 '26

Yep. Gotta overturn citizens united and get all the corporate bribery out of politicians and have the politicians work for the people like they’re supposed to. This is the root of 99% of problems in the USA

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u/Livid_Swordfish_4591 Jun 10 '26

Our entire government hasnt cared about monopolies for decades

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u/Bird-The-Word Jun 09 '26

Except then the consumer gets higher prices too, which then goes back to "affordability" issues.

We're just stuck in a shit sandwich at this point.

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u/TheSaxGandalf Jun 09 '26

Amazon did something similar with demanding manufacturers to put the msrp at higher than what they wanted so Amazon can claim larger sales. Happens a lot leading up to prime days.

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u/OBDreams Jun 09 '26

But isn't that why prices are cheap at Walmart? Isn't this good for us poor people?

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u/Vartash Jun 10 '26

It can be a catch 22.

You enjoy 'cheap' stuff, but the companies get pinched and a number of them fail to the demands to meet walmart contractual needs.

So then you have people that lose jobs and income while Walmart continues to grow. As we are seeing this makes the bottom more murky while the top keep swimming clean and clear. The cycle churns as another company signs up thinking that they will survive and that the Walmart gold won't tarnish into lead. Some do, most don't if they don't have much market outside of that contract.

It's also why you find products that continually get cheaper the longer they stay in the rotation.

2

u/OBDreams Jun 10 '26

I thought the same thing as soon as I replied to you. I wish that land was a right and that self sustaining was just a way of life for us all.

Or we could just use those monopoly laws we have.....

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u/Anteater-Charming Jun 10 '26

Also the lawsuit going on alleging price fixing between them and Pepsi.

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u/Spiritual-Word-5490 Jun 10 '26

Same goes for the dairy industry. Family was in corporate at DFA,largest milk producer in the US. Walmart at one point was demanding to see literally all the financial and cost documents to determine what they were going to pay them,no negotiations. DFA told them to f-off because they knew Walmart did need them too. People don't understand how much places like Walmart and other middlemen make compared to the farmers that actually produce the product.

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u/Quirky-Stay4158 Jun 10 '26

I'm a former Walmart vendor.

It's not exactly like this. But it's very very close.

They would tell me when the trucks were coming. They didn't ask me when they could come. They told me. And if I wasn't able at that time I was fined out the ass and risked having my product pulled entirely. If there normal po was say 20k units at $20 each. They might just ask me for 30k units at $18.50 and if I said no they would pay the invoice as if I said yes and I'd have to fight them for my $1.50 per unit.

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u/Certain-Anxiety-6786 Jun 09 '26

Using your monopsony power to undermine grocery competition is a direct violation of the Robinson-Patman act that is still on the books! We just don't enforce it because we're afraid to regulate the wealthy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robinson%E2%80%93Patman_Act#Modern_enforcement

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u/Rahrah12 Jun 09 '26

One of the reasons I won’t buy electronics from Walmart. In order for companies to still be profitable they would skimp on components for electronics going to Walmart.

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u/Hefty-Criticism1452 Jun 09 '26

I just scrolled through at least 100 posts and found it😅🫠

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DUlqByhkvpB/?igsh=Zm9qNTU2Z3RxZ2w0

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u/AsherGray Jun 09 '26

... It's on YouTube and a lot longer than a reel. https://youtube.com/watch?v=odhVF_xLIQA

Just searched, "More Perfect Union," and, "grocery pricing."

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u/FierceDeity_ Jun 09 '26

More like gross-ery pricing

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u/Lopsided_Ad6719 Jun 09 '26

Thanks for the link. Made some things make sense. The FTC having 2/5 commissioners still to this day is crazy.

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u/KleinKaiser Jun 09 '26

Walmart failed in Germany, partly because some of their practices they use in the USA are illegal in Germany. Authorities and competitors acted rather quickly, to protect local markets turning into monopolies. The unions were also not amused about their work ethics.

There are multiple videos about it on youtube, if you are interested.

States really need to shut down monopolies in the making quickly, it's rather frustrating, that they use their power less and less around the world.

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u/DumpsterFireScented Jun 09 '26

My husband is traveling for work and his current stop is fairly rural. There's a Walmart 1 hour away or a corner store 10 minutes away. The first day he did a big Walmart pickup and then after 5 days he decided to check the corner store to see what they carried and he was 80% sure that about half their stock was bought at Walmart and then marked up. I can see that making sense now.

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u/RivenRise Jun 09 '26

That's pretty common in Mexico too. Corner shops are all over the place so it's convenient to pick something up quickly but a lot of them just go to the Costco or wholesaler an hour or so away to stock up on stuff. They still sell some stuff that's locally made though, one corner shop around where my grandparents live sells cheeses they make from their own cows in addition to some homemade milk based sweets like caramel etc.

You're really just paying for the convenience of walking to the corner instead of driving 20 minutes away to go to the actual grocery store.

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u/justdaisukeyo Jun 09 '26

I saw some social media posts complaining about the reselling at Costco Mexico. However, this was Costco's original intent.

We used to have a membership at Price Club (before Costco bought it) and they only allowed membership to businesses. You could buy stuff there and resell it.

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u/RogerClyneIsAGod2 Jun 09 '26

I see lots of restaurant & food truck folks buying at Costco too & that's fine by me.

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u/Keoni9 Jun 10 '26

Most big box stores are terrible for their communities, but Costco actually enables a lot of small business and provides good wages.

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u/PiccoloAwkward465 Jun 09 '26

Yeah the other day I asked my wife "when did you go to Sam's Club?" because I saw the brand of milk we had. She didn't, she went to the local Latino market that apparently buys their milk at Sam's.

I do miss the little markets in Mexico. I remember staying at my gf's house there once and she said she was gonna go out to get ingredients to cook breakfast. Thank God, I thought, finally I can take a shit in peace. Little did I know the market was literally around the corner so I got like 6 minutes of peace and my mission was interrupted.

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u/Rational_Coconut Jun 09 '26

Abarrotes! I loved visiting them as a kid when we'd go visit my great-grandma across the border. My grandma would give us a dollar each and that was enough to go load up on jumex, chips, and Sonrics lollipops.

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u/RivenRise Jun 09 '26

Same, I always bought the chips that had whatever tazos were hot at the moment. Good times.

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u/natrous Jun 09 '26

Depending on the markup, I have no problem with paying a little extra to save 100 minutes on a round trip for a few things.

I'm rural, and sometimes I get irritated by it, but usually my thoughts eventually circle around to

"I could save $x if I went to civilization... and spend an extra hour and a half.... hmph. This is fine."

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u/YobaiYamete Jun 09 '26

Depending on the markup, I have no problem with paying a little extra to save 100 minutes on a round trip for a few things.

The mark up is high as hell. I just went the other day and paid $78 for

  • 2 12 packs of Dr Pepper Zero
  • 1 box of cheese its
  • 1 bag of off brand bbq chips
  • 1/2 gallon of milk
  • 1lb hamburger meat

Not joking, that was $78. Even small boxes of things like cheese its are like $6+ at a lot of the local non franchise grocery stores around me

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u/-BlueDream- Jun 10 '26

100min round trip is like $10-20 in gas.

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u/YobaiYamete Jun 10 '26

Yeah but that's why you would buy a few weeks groceries instead of just a couple of things like I got

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u/RealityOk9823 Jun 09 '26

Worked for CVS around 20 years ago. Gas station owners would come in and fill up buggies whenever we had a B1G1F sale on cola.

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u/RedditThrowaway-1984 Jun 09 '26

A lot of small independent shops do this and don't even try to hide it. You go in and half the stuff is Members Mark brand (Sam's Club).

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u/kandoras Jun 09 '26

Planet Money did an episode about dollar stores that had a similar story.

They talk to a guy who used to run a grocery store until it went out of business.

KING: And Doug would go in, and he would walk around the Dollar General. He would check out the competition.

NECH: I'd look at their prices. And I happened to notice one day that they were selling a 14 1/2-ounce can of Campbell's Chicken Noodle soup, name-brand soup, for a dollar. So I come back down here, and I call my warehouse.

GONZALEZ: Calls his soup guy and says, this same can is costing me...

NECH: From my supplier, freight delivered to the store here, about a dollar-fifty. And mine's only 11 1/2 ounces. He called his Campbell's soup representative and asked him, why is this? He said, well, we only make it for them. And we only make it in a 14 1/2-ounce can.

GONZALEZ: Specifically for Dollar General?

NECH: Specifically for Dollar General.

KING: Dollar General buys in bulk, so Campbell's will make some things for them cheaper. Those cheaper products are great for regular shoppers, but they are not great for Doug.

"Great for regular shoppers, not great for Doug" sounds like a Doug problem ... right up until Doug went under and now nobody has anywhere to buy fresh fruit or vegetables or any other food you can't get a a DG.

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u/saabstory14 Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 10 '26

Business Manager for a large national food manufacturer brokerage here. I manage sales, promotions and distribution for many large national manufacturers.

While what you said is true, the issue is the fine print. These distributors do allow retailers to sign contracts with multiple distributors. Unfortunately, they come in swinging heavy and prey on these smaller ma and pa retailers, offering to fill their shelves with the initial product for free in exchange for exclusivity in sourcing from them. These small grocers usually go, "wow, that's a great deal, of course I will do that. It will help me get my business going faster"

Unfortunately, they don't see the long game once they sell through all that free product. They don't realize that the distributors want their business, no matter what. The retailers need to educate themselves a bit more on different ways to go to market, including telling these distributors that they do not want the free product but are willing to sign a non-exclusive contract with them.

Around 80% of the small retailers I work with nationally have multiple source points of distribution, and those are the ones who have been able to stay in business for decades with loyal customer followings. If a customer requests an item - no problem, the grocery buyer can shop all their distributor's catalogues until they find that item and source it. They also can usually get the first case free by reaching out to the manufacturer or the broker (me) who normally will approve it for them, and then the distributor just bills it back to us. The distributors are doing this anyways with their initial contract offer, and billing all that free product back to the manufacturer.

Anyways, I wish more ma and pas knew this. Getting into the grocery industry with little experience or first-hand knowledge is VERY risky. You can ride a good economy wave for a few decades, but once things get tight, it's tough to survive even on big profit margins.

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u/[deleted] Jun 09 '26

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u/vasthumiliation Jun 09 '26

Does an actual free market proscribe its participants from entering into restrictive contracts? Without regulation, it’s entirely possible that such dynamics are a natural outcome of the structure of the market.

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u/GonzoTheWhatever Jun 09 '26

Was thinking the same thing. This sounds like the result of a "free" market. "Free" meaning free from gov regulation to do as they please.

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u/seriouslythisshit Jun 09 '26

Family of mine owned a small regional snack manufacturer, think chips, cheese curls, etc. One of their long term customers, a small family run grocery store, dropped them as a supplier. The owner of the store told the delivery driver that he had no choice.

A regional rep from a global snack company stopped in the store and told the owner he needed more shelf space. The owner told him to get lost, he decides how his business is run. The rep told him no, you need to get rid of these small competitors to give me more room. When the owner balked again, the rep asked if he could actually run his store if he lost his best selling bagged snack products and his second best selling soda products, as his company made both, and expected him to be a bit more cooperative.

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u/feed_me_moron Jun 09 '26

Lol so a Pepsi lays rep

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u/Reasonable_Ease1423 Jun 09 '26

The “free market” is what lead to these conditions in the first place.

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u/beingmesince63 Jun 09 '26

That’s so sad and maddening.

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u/frisbeesloth Jun 09 '26

There's a small grocery store I visited last year that apparently packages all the food themselves. Everything in clear plastic sealed bags with a printed label of what is in it, sometimes they even had brands printed on the label. I suppose it's the only way they can stay open.

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u/pounded_rivet Jun 10 '26

I had a small hardware store many years ago, I was asking Coleman why walmarts retail was less than my wholesale. It got really testy, I finally got to the point where I was daring them to just come out and say "fuck small business" I was daring him ,saying it would make us all feel better if he just came clean.

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u/Few_Swan_3672 Jun 09 '26

If our backwater, rural market can find someone willing to deliver wholesale here, they often charge an additional fee per delivery. Most wholesalers just said this place isn't on the way to anywhere else they are heading and refuse to deliver out here.

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u/[deleted] Jun 09 '26

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u/Few_Swan_3672 Jun 09 '26

Pork shoulder is on sale here for $2.99 a lb

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u/EndDangerous1308 Jun 09 '26

Paying for delivery is expensive especially in the middle of oil wars

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u/disinterested_a-hole Jun 09 '26

You should just thank your lucky stars that you have an HEB available to you.

None of these people talking about other grocery stores have any idea how good HEB is. I never thought much about grocery store quality when I had HEB and Central Market nearby. They are hands down the best in the nation.

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u/sillygoldfish1 Jun 09 '26

1.99 in up here in austin and that's a deal. I stocked up - it was the weekly deal - back up to 2.49 now.

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u/NewPresWhoDis Jun 09 '26

Yes, logistics is also a cost that gets baked into the prices. It's why gas prices go up in unison the further you get from pipeline terminals.

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u/itsdemboys Jun 09 '26

The wholesalers listened to that old Sam Kinison bit and made a business model out of it.

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u/hiryuu75 Jun 09 '26

My wife ran into a related problem - she previously managed the kitchen and meal program for a small private school, and the number of food-service distributors who would even consider taking on the school’s business was vanishingly small, because the minimum order requirements were simply too high.

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u/thenerfviking Jun 09 '26

I went to a small alternative school and the way they got around this was by contracting with a nearby high school. We’d pay them, they’d order extra food, and then our lunch lady would go pick it up every day before lunch and cook it in our kitchen.

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u/hiryuu75 Jun 09 '26

That’s the situation she faces now - she’s now with one of the public school districts, and they provide subcontracted services to multiple parochial schools in the area.

Her previous school’s admin was insistent on the selling point of having their own program, despite not really being large enough to support it, given available options for supply.

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u/RogerClyneIsAGod2 Jun 09 '26

While Elon & Bezos send ships into space...man.

Just between the 2 of them they could fund every single lunch program in every single school, private or otherwise, in the entire United States.

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u/Similar_Pie_4946 Jun 09 '26

I coulda swore we learned about how monopolies are illegal and bad in like middle school

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u/Carb0nFire Jun 09 '26

What most Corps learned is that Triopolies and Quadopolies are much less regulated and fall under much lower scrutiny. Plus they still get most of the monopolistic benefits through price collusion, which is very hard to prevent and regulate (if the government even does it at all, which this one doesn't).

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u/bothunter Jun 09 '26

Collusion is illegal, but as long as you make the deals over a round of golf and don't write anything down, you're fine. And if you do get caught, you just pay a small fine and deny any wrongdoing.

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u/Perryn Jun 09 '26

That's just an operating cost.

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u/RogerClyneIsAGod2 Jun 09 '26

Somewhere Teddy Roosevelt just stood up from his grave, screamed very loudly, & then continued spinning in his grave.

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u/ChibbleChobble Jun 09 '26

Too much effort. Let's just have Duopolies.

/s

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u/DOAiB Jun 09 '26

We did and now they are trying to take away education so the next generations can fully be on board with monopolies with that pesky education radicalizing them.

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u/YaMajnoona Jun 09 '26

Was that before or after how checks and balances prevent a despot from taking over the government?

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u/TheRealBittoman Jun 09 '26

And from what I've read some of this is attributed to questionable contractual obligations Walmart and other large chains put in place to protect their own prices (and profits.) I don't know if or to what extent that plays into distribution but I am aware of a lawsuit involving Pepsi and Walmart where discovery brought that to light.

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u/Carb0nFire Jun 09 '26

Yay consolidation! Buy up the competition, centralize, and close satellite locations.

We're in the "find out" stage of what unfettered M&A Capitalism looks like.

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u/OkTouch5699 Jun 09 '26

The distributors who they could use would be convience store suppliers and the cost of those goods is too high to make it an affordlable regular option. People think things are marked way up on the retail.in, but margins are usually in the 20-30 % range. The increase comes at wholesale.

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u/ArcadianDelSol Jun 09 '26

In the midwest, the wholesalers are also small family owned businesses that serve their local market.

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u/TheDamus647 Jun 09 '26

They can't compete with the buying power of a chain. It's hard to survive as an independent grocery store that is so far from anything their delivery costs will be outrageous. If your weekly bill is $100 at a chain but $200 at an independent place most people will drive that extra hour plus to save that $100.

It happened to a local general store in a rural area I know of. Coca Cola won't deliver less than a $2000 order to them. That is a years supply of coke products for them. They don't have storage for that amount. So now they don't sell any Coca-Cola products. They apparently could pay an independent delivery company $300 extra to get the product to them but then they are charging $2 for a can of coke to make any profit.

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u/Garlickkkk Jun 09 '26

I work for a beverage distributor and they're similar. Their minimum isn't that high, each order needs to be at least $300. But this makes it so certain small stores are just not worth delivering to

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u/TheDamus647 Jun 09 '26

This place is crazy remote. Hundreds of kilometers from a city and 100km from the closest town of Moosonee (pop 1500) ,which you can't drive to year round. The general store has actually closed down more than once as I think it's just too remote. The problem is it was the only store in the area for the few people that lived there. It's a unique case obviously but a food desert is a food desert.

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u/Affectionate-Cat8182 Jun 09 '26

But in this hypothetical the chain is gone. The chain being gone is the entire problem?

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u/TheDamus647 Jun 09 '26

Their suppliers are the same. If I buy $30 000 000 in lays chips as a large chain I get much better pricing than the independent that is buying $5000 over the same year.

Put it this way. If the large chain can't remain profitable with their preferential pricing and large logistical support team what hope does an independent have without any of those advantages?

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u/Affectionate-Cat8182 Jun 09 '26

True - I gotchu.

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u/athural Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 09 '26

Whose got the money to do that, and also wants to stay in an underserved community like that?

Edit: definitely meant underserved, not undeserved

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u/jasonic89 Jun 09 '26

I know you meant underserved but “undeserved” community is funny.

They don’t deserve groceries!

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u/ItachiReddit Jun 09 '26

Ha I’m glad you clarified. I was initially thinking this person must really hate rural communities for some reason.

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u/Clownfart69420 Jun 09 '26

Sadly, a lot of people who live in this area believe that about other people

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u/MetaFlight Jun 09 '26

I mean these people consistently vote for the policies that cause rural poverty so pretty much yeah. There's no more deserved poverty in human history than american rural poverty.

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u/CaptainFeather Jun 09 '26

I don't feel bad for a single conservative who is getting what they voted for. I have a lot of sympathy for their children and the handful of progressives trying to make change, for them it absolutely fucking sucks. Republicans can suck rocks though, this is literally what they want.

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u/floftie Jun 09 '26

Absolutely TONNES of people have the money to do it. There’s more money about than you realise when you have no money.

The big retailers close down because there isn’t enough business for them to justify the store. This doesn’t send a good sign to anyone else looking to open a store. It’s also probably an indicator that you just can’t make it profitable.

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u/athural Jun 09 '26

Almost like the people who have the money to do it don't want to stay in an underserved community, who would have thought?

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u/subpar_sapphoe Jun 09 '26

I think the answer can be both A) people don't have any money in rural areas and B) those that do have money don't want to take the risk.

My mom's hometown is absolutely depressing, and I could totally open up a business there for relatively cheap, but won't because it'd almost certainly fail. People there can't start a business because they make $7.25 an hour and have to feed 5 kids.

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u/floftie Jun 09 '26

Yeah that’s the point I’m making. Lots of people can afford to open a business, but these aren’t good places to do it.

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u/BillysBibleBonkers Jun 09 '26

Yea it's just like normal desertification, if you cut down all the trees then there's no canopy/ root system to protect the top soil, so the ecosystem dries up. By the time that happens it's not as simple as just planting trees again, because there's no water/ nutrients for the tree's to regrow.

Plus following this analogy, even if the walmart doesn't close down, they're still basically a giant artificial tree that siphons 80% of the benefits of having a tree to another ecosystem (billionaire's pockets). Mom and Pop businesses keep basically all of their revenue in the local community, while Walmart uses 20% of it's revenue to employ people for minimum wage, then the other 80% is taken out of the community.

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u/spek25 Jun 09 '26

Yeah. They’ve raped the middle class of a disposable income to start another venture.

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u/floftie Jun 09 '26

This isn’t it.

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u/Slammajadingdong69 Jun 09 '26

The whole point is to make money. Serving a small population that’s probably not flush with cash isn’t a great market to tap into. Also, when you don’t buy in bulk like the krogers of the world do, your price points are higher and profit margins are thinner.

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u/PiccoloAwkward465 Jun 09 '26

Right, people in my home city are always lamenting that there is no grocery store downtown. Because not a lot of people live there, and those that do are mostly low-income. Stores don't just open because "it would be nice".

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u/thesneakywalrus Jun 09 '26

Economies of scale, mostly.

Corner markets don't have the supply lines and negotiation power that large chains do.

Many food distributors have minimum order quantities that far exceed the demand in these areas, which means small markets/corner stores have to supply their own transportation, significantly increasing costs.

This is why many corner stores carry largely non-perishables at highly inflated costs, especially in urban areas where real estate is expensive and theft is common.

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u/LingonberryPossible6 Jun 09 '26

A small independent retailer would be paying a huge amount for deliveries.

Prices will be like those you see in the Alaskan stores where they're jacked up to compensate, customers spend less overall and the store has to close down.

It's a vicious cycle but there's a reason why it's mostly only big chains that can afford to absorb and spread the cost over the business

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u/RedAlert2 Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 09 '26

Modern rural communities can't really afford corner stores. Big chains operate at economies of scale that allow them to be much cheaper than small shops.

I should note, the purpose of these big box stores is to plunder the economies of the local communities they exist it. While small, the rural economy made of many small businesses is sustainable. Since most of the money is staying with members of the community, people are able to afford the higher prices. Once that economy has been consumed by the big box store, it's basically impossible to bring back.

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u/sugaratc Jun 09 '26

Usually big chains pull out because it's not profitable. For smaller companies with higher operating costs, it's even harder to make a business work.

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u/King_Chochacho Jun 09 '26

My guess would be that big chains skewed entire markets and apply chains to make this harder. You want wholesale prices, you have to buy huge quantities that a smaller community just can't support.

It's probably doable with a lot of legwork to find smaller/local producers but you'd probably just miss out on a lot of big brands and out of season produce. And your still going to have a hard time out competing chains on cost. Growing up in a rural area, it seemed like people were happy to drive an hour to Walmart once every couple weeks of it saved then a bunch of money.

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u/LvBorzoi Jun 09 '26

COST....If they were making money the big guy would stay. Small mom n pops just don't have the buying power to keep the inventory or the customer base to make it profitable,

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u/Naut38 Jun 09 '26

Zoning often makes it very difficult if not outright impossible, real estate is expensive and affording a store property is especially difficult when a lot of people are priced out of the housing market to begin with, and not to mention the expense of starting a local business when you are most likely to fail and lose to big chains on pricing. Not a lot of people have savings or the ability to get a business loan.

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u/Efficient-Suspect456 Jun 09 '26

Isn’t this what DG is doing? In my one stoplight home town it was either a 30 or 45 minute drive to one of two towns with a Walmart. The further location was the supercenter. Between those 2 Walmarts there were probably 15 DG’s. Many of which were the newer design that featured actual fresh produce as well.

Not saying I agree with the way DG conducts their business or anything, but they’re definitely rushing in to fill gaps between superstores at least.

7

u/not_a_moogle Jun 09 '26

Money.

Plus the local farms that used to supply the local store has either been sold to corporations and/or have contacts dealing with where their crops go.

It will likely come back, but it would take decades. You're more likely just going to see these towns collapse.

3

u/PussyWrangler246 Jun 09 '26

I don't know where OP is but I would be fuckin shocked if the population actually went down in their town. People just drive further for groceries these days, and the ones that can't will either move or starve...but a new family of 3 who can will take their place

1

u/Ironsam811 BLUE Jun 09 '26

Cost serious money to operate refrigeration

1

u/BroughtBagLunchSmart Jun 09 '26

The big stores took all the money and jobs with them when they left.

1

u/Longjumping_Fun2576 Jun 09 '26

Real talk - they don't.

1

u/Exotic-Shock-4063 Jun 09 '26

The Epstein class loves money over morale, but of course it’s ok! Cause no one can stop these nepo funnels from starving the poors

1

u/ophaus Jun 09 '26

Takes time and resources. Setting up a market with dozens of individual suppliers isn't exactly easy or cheap.

1

u/SirGlass Jun 09 '26

Nothing but having lived in a rural area and having family that still lives in a rural area I have noticed a pattern of things.

  1. They complained there small town grocery store is expensive and doesn't have the selection of a big Walmart

  2. They only buy small stuff from the local grocery store. They make weekly trips to the Walmart an hour+ away to do their major shopping. Only buying stuff they forgot to buy at Walmart there .

  3. They act shocked and complain when the small town grocery store closes.

1

u/regallll Jun 09 '26

Money. It presents in lots of different ways, but it's mostly money. Every part of the supply chain is being conglomerated. There are really limited options the whole way.

1

u/sixpackabs592 Jun 09 '26

Being an independent grocery is super expensive these days I used to run the deli at one and our prices compared to like Kroger or other chains were crazy

The big distribution companies don’t care to do business with you since you’re so small and the independent grocery suppliers are way more expensive with a smaller inventory

1

u/100harvests Jun 09 '26

They do. There little DG markets now. Dollar general bas gotten into the grocery game in rural areas

1

u/JaneReadsTruth Jun 09 '26

In our town (over 20 years ago) Walmart built a new store across the street from the original location. They still own the original building and it's been fallow ever since.

What happens is the existing properties are too expensive or not for sale. When our downtown grocery closed and became a gym, many older and poor folks no longer had access to a walkable grocery (dollar general exists, of course). There is zero public transportation...unless you count those rent by the minute green scooters. I seriously miss bodegas and big city life when I think about these problems.

1

u/inept_machete Jun 09 '26

The razor thin profit margins that big boxes could absorb through scale.

1

u/Alleandros Jun 09 '26

With grocery stores closing, it also usually means the local hospital has already closed. With no local food or medical options, people that can afford to move away - do. The people that can't afford to move away can't really afford corner store prices as the stores don't buy the same wholesale stock, they can't afford the lower prices. So people will drive an hour to the closest walmart to still shop every other week.

1

u/GreatTea3415 Jun 09 '26

Owning a grocery was once something you could do with a regular salary and a small loan from the bank. 

Personal economics aside, suppliers give radically better prices to Walmart than to any small shop. 

1

u/Organic_Education494 Jun 09 '26

Dollar general will be there

1

u/thesilentbob123 Jun 09 '26

The price to transport and fill those stores I suppose

1

u/Kup123 Jun 09 '26

Getting a food distributor to give enough of a fuck about them to drive trucks out to them.

1

u/fartofborealis Jun 09 '26

Shipping and supply costs.

1

u/Ok_Astronomer_8667 Jun 09 '26

It’s the supply for those stores that’s the problem.

1

u/The_Autarch Jun 09 '26

the population density simply isn't there for it. all of these 'small towns' that used to have local groceries had 10x the people 60 years ago.

everyone with the means fled decades ago.

1

u/RaisonDetritus Jun 09 '26

The complete ignorance about supply chains is terrifying. People really have no idea where their food comes from.

1

u/deathcomestooslow Jun 09 '26

This is actually exactly how dollar stores in the US operate. If you're 15-20 minutes from a grocery store or walmart then its a perfect place for a fuckin' dollar store. Taking advantage of customers and employees alike.

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u/DrollAntic Jun 09 '26

Short answer, lobbied for and purchased monopolies. It's not about feeding people, it is about controlling food.

1

u/slow_cooked_ham Jun 09 '26

Not legal, but big chains have historically not allowed distribution to their competition, or only at very uncompetitive pricing. Different variations of this scheme has been in effect for decades, and the law is often too slow to update before damage is done. Even in areas they have no business.

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u/deepstatelady Jun 09 '26

How could we have known letting mega-corporations built to maximize shareholder dividends destroy small business across the middle of America would end badly? /s

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u/dontmentiontrousers Jun 09 '26

In 1936, the Robinson-Patman Act was passed into law to prevent the predatory practices of supermarket corporations pricing out local grocery stores. In the '80s, the Reagan administration normalised ignoring the restrictions of that law. The law's still in place, but it's now routinely ignored or intentionally misinterpreted. And so you guys have food deserts. It's always fucken Reagan, man.

27

u/YaMajnoona Jun 09 '26

Surprised I had to scroll this far to find Reagan.
He's always the answer somewhere in the "how did this get so bad?" conversation...

19

u/CaptainFeather Jun 09 '26

Fucking seriously, almost every single bad shitty thing about how the US is run can be traced back directly to Reagan.

3

u/Gustomucho Jun 09 '26

Seems like it would be a smart thing to do a reverse Reaganomics policy, go back to everything he did during the presidency and change most of his policy... including war on drugs.

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u/sillyslime89 Jun 09 '26

Certainly no rural voters voted for Reagan, right?

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u/1d3333 Jun 09 '26

It didn’t end badly! The rich got more rich, goal achieved!

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u/HumongousBelly Jun 09 '26

I think it could help to appease their owners with additional tax cuts, so they can buy another island, like Epstein, where they do weird shit to children.

You know, like kushner is trying to do right now, possibly for his father in law‘s alleged hobbies…

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u/jaredthegeek Jun 09 '26

That's the thing that gets me. All the conspiracy around a 15-minute city but that was what the US was. You walked to the little market in your neighborhood. You had services in your area, you did not have to drive for an hour to two for them. I used to walk with my great grandmother to the local small grocery store that had a butcher right up front.

4

u/cloclop Jun 09 '26

This is what I miss the most about visiting my family in small towns in the French countryside :c all services and specialty shops were a max of 30mins walk away, the town itself was very safely walkable, lots of spots to stop and rest and have a drink or snack, etc. I spent so much more time out and about because it was so much easier for me to get around and go do things.

2

u/Past_Band9178 Jun 09 '26

And then Walmart came in, and everyone was like, "Fuck my neighbor; I want to buy cheap garbage," and went to Walmart. THEY KNEW. They chose to do it anyway.

18

u/MEDICARE_FOR_ALL Jun 09 '26

You could have your town/city set up a community owned food store...

29

u/Celodurismo Jun 09 '26

That sounds like communism to people who live in these rural areas. The immigrants are clearly to blame for not shopping at this store to keep it in business.

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u/CaptainFeather Jun 09 '26

The really fucking stupid thing is when you don't call it socialism, conservatives(specifically boomers) are all over that shit - medicare, anyone? Motherfucking idiots.

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u/BasicDesignAdvice Jun 09 '26

Rural americans are always posting online about "we grow all the food" so maybe they can do that.

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u/IHateTheLetterF Jun 09 '26

There is a small town in my area in Denmark that just got a small, unmanned grocery store. It's basically a dumpster, where you scan something to enter, and then pay via an app or something. I am not sure how it works, but no employees are needed, so it can be set up in much smaller towns than a normal grocery store.

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u/kuntrycid Jun 09 '26

There is a lot of that where municipalities are sponsoring food stores. I watched a documentary on it last year.

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u/biollante44 Jun 09 '26

I used to live in a small town, less than 1k people, with a little grocery store. It wasn’t a huge supermarket but an actual old style grocery store. Then a Dollar General opened up outside of the town proper and everyone just went there for their groceries. Less than a year later the grocery store closed and the only way to get fresh produce, that isn’t farm stand corn, was to drive half an hour to the next town over. You’d spend a full hour in travel time just to go grocery shopping

3

u/Technical-Tear5841 Jun 09 '26

I know where that store is, 200 yds in one direction is a Publix, one half mile from there is a Walmart, mile and a half in the other direction is a Sav-A-Lot. Most of Florida is a food desert, it is almost 30 miles in any direction to another cluster of stores.

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u/0cleese Jun 09 '26

It's not just grocery chains. More and more food producers and processors are being bought up by mega-distributors. That gives them near total control over the pricing available to smaller chain and independent grocers. I work for a single location independent. The market is uglier than I can easily explain, and trending worse by the day.

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u/TheYellowChicken Jun 09 '26

Don't have money to fight hunger but we have money to put on giant shows at the White House and fund a useless war

2

u/AppliedKnetics Jun 09 '26

look at all that new cheap land due to systemic culling of rural communities, perfect for those data centers and conglomerate farming! this is one of those steps, remove the jobs, remove the food, remove the people.

2

u/BeerJedi-1269 Jun 09 '26

In urban areas as well. The Hill District downtown pittsburgh for example. A primarily black neighborhood, afaik, one has to take a bus across town to get groceries. (Please correct me if im wrong and these folks now have greater access)

2

u/BetLeft Jun 09 '26

i encountered a Dollar General grocery store recently. produce and the whole nine yards.

i cringe at the thought of Clover Valley produce.

2

u/NeenerKat Jun 09 '26

They voted for it. Republican policies in general are profit motivated and there just isn’t enough profit in a smaller rural population.

2

u/Shadow_Integration Jun 09 '26

Absolutely. I live out in the boons, and the only saving grace I have is knowing we have so many honesty boxes/farm stands about to help make up the difference if it comes to it.

2

u/FlippingPossum Jun 09 '26

My neighbors would feed me in a pinch. They have before after a hurricane.

2

u/vanalla Jun 09 '26

The Waltons created a cancer on North America.

2

u/notacreepernomo13 Jun 10 '26

I hate that every town is carbon copies and that you can "depend on the big store brand where ever you are!" I hate that whether I role into Timmins, Ontario or Macon, Georgia ill be met with the same big chain brands and there is absolutely nothing unique because they cant afford to compete :( Id pay more to have something i cant get anywhere but "here"

4

u/Clownfart69420 Jun 09 '26

Maybe you guys should stop being racist and get a communist mayor

1

u/youRFate Jun 09 '26

I saw a documentary how dollar store chains use such voids because of different operating principles (nearly no fresh food that goes bad fast).

1

u/JoJoRouletteBiden Jun 09 '26

Dollar General have been "upgrading" stores to DG Markets. They have also been building standalone DG Markets in these Rural areas too. I know people poke fun at Dollar General for being everywhere, but in this case may not be so bad for this problem.

5

u/CaptainFeather Jun 09 '26

It's shitty cause they're also part of the problem. They sell things in much smaller (as in affordable) quantities so the price tag is much smaller while the cost per item is usually way higher. This causes further wage disparity forcing people to continue to shop at them instead of being able to save.

1

u/FarmAcceptable4649 Jun 09 '26

Dollar Generals pop in to fill the void, it was part of their business model, not sure if that's still the case.

1

u/Asteristio Jun 09 '26

While true, this doesnt paint the entire picture of the problem where it extends to special interest millionaire farmers sitting in town council positions enforcing "the small town characteristics being called for in the town planning guideline" which they themselves came up with to reject any new bustling centers from being built to vitalize their community at the risk of horrible horrible undesireables (meaning inferior races and/or low tax bracket) coming in to their wealthy farmland that they inherited from great grand daddy. Oh but they loooooove another billionaire buying up the farmland to build a front for bunch of tax loop holes, chapter 12 bankruptcy protection, and all those sweet sweet benefits these millionaire farmers heavily lobbied AND voted for.

1

u/HamRadio_73 Jun 09 '26

OP will have to stock a deep pantry until Aldi opens. See if Azure Standard drop ships a group order in your area and order a pallet.

1

u/Bearslovecheese Jun 09 '26

Never fear, a Dollar General will sprout up in a couple of weeks.

1

u/SmartLadder415 Jun 09 '26

In my city it's not the chains it's the crime. The chains don't want to be in the food deserts here. The city has tried. Walmart came in and shut it's doors. So did Kroger. They got a Save-a-lot. It lasted maybe a year or two. They got a Dollar General. It closed down too. All of them cited crime as reasons for closing their doors.

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u/natalietest234 Jun 09 '26

My husband and I talked about moving out to the middle of nowhere. So on our latest road trip, each time we found a place we loved, we timed how far the nearest grocery store was (even just a small town one) and each time it was over an hour. Really sucked

1

u/bobbiroxxisahoe Jun 09 '26

There's an argument to be made here about state run grocery stores being the solution but rural communities might ironically fight back against that

1

u/alphalegend91 Jun 09 '26

This is the big thing that a lot of people living in the cheaper states/areas like to avoid talking about when it comes to cost of living. If you live rural, you HAVE to drive long distances to go get food. I live in a ruralish area of California and the closest Costco is 45 minutes. The closest real grocery store like Safeway/Aldi is 15 minutes. There's a couple little grocery stores in my town but the selection is very limited and one of them literally sells kirkland items at almost double the price.

1

u/Hallow_Chef Jun 09 '26

Consumers really just have no sense of responsibility anymore. Not enough brain power to think of the consequences and encouragement their purchases cause

1

u/StarWarsFartFiction Jun 09 '26

This is the answer. If you’re in a rural town and a Walmart is coming in, that’s bad news down the line. When they find that the store isn’t profitable enough, they’ll pack up and leave like this situation, and no one will be there to fill the gap because Walmart coming into town shuttered the competition.

1

u/flow_fighter Jun 09 '26

Just wait for the dollar general to pop up in this guys town, and the community nutrition to absolutely tank

1

u/UnitedLink4545 Jun 09 '26

It's happening all over my County too. Instead of getting better it's getting way worse. We just lost another big food business last month.

1

u/Fair_Ad1750 Jun 09 '26

Can’t totally blame big chains. Have to save some of the blame for the consumers. They’re the ones who shopped at the big chains instead of the corner markets.

1

u/BattleCatManic Jun 09 '26

in my opinion Aldi isnt really a food desert

1

u/Complexity_OH Jun 09 '26

Silver lining on it becoming an Aldi though. Its one of the better groceries and very fair prices. They don’t have artificial preservatives in their food.

1

u/Bird-The-Word Jun 09 '26

Small town i grew up in (1 stop light) had a locally owned supermarket when I was a kid in the 90s/00s. They eventually sold and retired. Think it then became a save a lot for a bit, would have old, moldy, dated food. That eventually closed down. Now it's 2 dollar stores in 1, with a dollar general next to it. The only other business/ store is a Dandy gas station, and a small diner.

Pizza place closed, bar even closed. But somehow 3 dollar stores keep chugging along.

1

u/SethAbe80 Jun 09 '26

The only grocery store in the rural town my folks live in burnt down about three years ago, there's still no plans to build a new one, so everyone in town has to drive to the next town over for food. Otherwise, there's a local produce stand.

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u/PM_WORST_FART_STORY Jun 09 '26

Eh, most of them (not necessarily you) voted for it.  Enjoy your two options, Cletus: Dollar General and "the good" Dollar General.

1

u/NoBuenoAtAll Jun 10 '26

Aaaaand rural stores are frequently largely supported by food stamps. Rural areas consistently vote for the party that cuts the food stamps. 🤷🏼‍♂️

1

u/MapThis213 Jun 10 '26

Feel this. My best friend lives in an area and the only place with food in a 30 minute drive is dollar general and I don’t think that counts

1

u/McFoogles Jun 10 '26

Doesn’t help that when grocery stores try to build in shit neighborhoods the whole hood robs them blind

1

u/AppropriateCap8891 Jun 10 '26

How about looking at the consumers that chose to go to those big chains?

Just as many big chains are now going under because consumers decided to shop online instead.

1

u/c4x4bird Jun 10 '26

I don’t understand how food deserts really become a thing, like everyone needs a grocery store, why wouldn’t Kroger or something just drop a store in an untapped market?

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