You go to them, and everything there–everything–costs just 99¢. Nowadays that seems like such a bargain. But 20, 30 years ago we would have said that that was too much for many of the items there. The reason: inflation. But inflation is still happening. So I’m curious: when will inflation make 99¢ stores no longer financially viable?
I imagine we’ll have buck-fifty stores eventually.
Well, it depends on how you define the term “99¢ store”. One could argue that they’ll never really go out of business, they’ll just change names and morph into “$2 stores”, just like the “5 and 10 cent” stores grew up into big 50¢ and 99¢ stores.
But that just begs the question. You want to know when they’ll have to change names again. Simple. Watch the current ones. Eventually they’ll change from “Everything 99¢ or less” to “Almost Everything 99¢ or less” to “Most items 99¢ or less” to “Many items 99¢ or less”, and then you’ll know it’s over.
And eventually we’ll have the “5 and 10 dollar” stores.
Well the one near me is now called the Dollar Store. Must be inflation, lol.
I love the 99 cent and dollar stores. But I’ve noticed that not everything isn’t cheaper. For instance, a bottle of VO5 shampoo, same size, is only 79cents at Walmart.
Everything shall come and pass. Some day the 99 cent stores will go the way of the 5 and dime.
Well, even when there were 5 and dimes, certain things would’ve still been a bargain at $1.
Maybe the dollar stores will just keep up with inflation and in 10 years they’ll be selling VCRs.
Happy
Maybe one day they’ll have “Everything’s At Market!” stores. Something to go along with your lobster tails and Alaskan snow crabs.
This reminds me of a scene in Back to the Future II. The Doc and Marty arrive and Marty puts on his disguise, the Doc says:
“Ok Marty, go sit in the diner and order a Pepsi, heres a fifty.”
:D.
I don’t know what its like in the US, but lots of so-called “Dollar stores” up here in Canada sell stuff that over a dollar. In fact, most of the stuff they carry is over a dollar.
Its funny when there are multiple dollar stores in the same plaza. I find the idea of dollar store competition amusing
I’d guess 20 years left. Then you’ll have a $5 store.
The one near me is now called the 99+ cent store. See? Easy.
They’ll be around as long as companies are willing to sell them their overstock at drastic savings. Though I have to admit I’ve seen a few $2 stores, and some stores called “About a Dollar or So” (how wishy-washy!).
As long as they can a) have items manufactured in and shipped from China for under a dollar per unit and b) are able to pick up overstock/about to expire/went out of business inventory, there will always be dollar stores. We had a dollar store here in Madison that went out of business and all their inventory was picked up by another dollar store. I was amused by that. The receipts still print up the name of the old store.
There is an actual growing dollar store chain that recently announced they are building several stores in our area. They claim to have nothing over a dollar. Can’t be that bad of a market.
Thanks (?) to fuel prices going up, we have staved off deflation but once oil prices go down again, look out. 50 cent stores might make a comeback.
Exactly wrong. Increases in the nominal cost of transportation are inflationary, not deflationary. Specifically this is called “cost-push” inflation. What’s currently causing deflationary pressure is a lack of demand for finished goods, especially higher dollar stuff such as televisions and cars.
I’m an idiot. This is what I get for subsisting entirely off of coffee and nicotine. Back to your regularly scheduled programming and such…
Plus I think they have some products made especially for their outlets…I notice a lot of brand name products come in oddly smaller portion containers.
So maybe in 20 years you will still be able to get a 99 cent Coke - in a 1/2 ounce bottle.