Could Amazon acquire Dollar General?

Grocery retail expert and consultant Brittain Ladd believes Dollar General might be ripe for the picking for Amazon.

In an article for New York-based Observer Media, Ladd wrote that he recently read an article in Retail Leader, a sister publication of Store Brands, about how Dollar General is fast becoming a major retailer of groceries. Ladd said in the article that he agrees with its author, Retail Leader Editor in Chief Mike Troy, that Dollar General has the potential to become a bigger threat to established grocery retailers than Amazon/Whole Foods Market.

Ladd, who wrote in another article in 2013 that Seattle-based Amazon should require Whole Foods Market (Amazon did in 2017), asks in the Observer Media article what retailer might acquire Dollar General if the Goodlettsville, Tenn.-based retailer was ever to be sold.

“I have assessed the question from different points of view, and I always come to the same conclusion—the company that I believe should acquire Dollar General is Amazon,” Ladd wrote. “Amazon requires additional retail space and a better strategy for attracting low-income consumers who prefer Walmart and dollar stores. Anything Amazon can do to pull customers away from Walmart and increase grocery sales would benefit Amazon. Acquiring Dollar General would create exceptional opportunities for Amazon to expand its grocery footprint.”

Ladd noted that Amazon, if it acquired Dollar General, could introduce new products into the stores and build larger discount stores to attract more low-income consumers.

“Amazon has done a great job of attracting high-end consumers and middle-class consumers,” Ladd said in the article. “Acquiring Dollar General would expand Amazon’s customer base and help the company grow even more by creating a customer experience specific to the needs of low-income shoppers.”

But even if Amazon doesn’t acquire Dollar General, Ladd wrote that he believes the retailer could operate 25,000 stores 10 years from now and look completely different from the company it is today.

“I believe the sky is the limit for Dollar General,” he said.

To read his entire article in Observer Media, click here.