Placer.ai: Grocery shopping continues to rise at Dollar General
Dollar General’s recent efforts to deepen its grocery presence with fresh produce, expanded frozen assortments, and “everyday essentials” has paid off with customers dealing with economic uncertainty.
From the second quarter of 2019 to 2Q 2025, share of overall grocery visits at the nation’s largest dollar store chain has risen consistently while traditional supermarket chains such as Kroger and Albertson’s have seen visitors drop off by nearly four percentage points each, according to Placer.ai.
Cross-visitation data run by the foot traffic analytics provider found that Kroger customers are increasingly supplementing their shops with Dollar General, while Dollar General customers are reducing their reliance on Kroger.
In Q2 2019, some 41% of Kroger shoppers cross-shopped at Dollar General. In the second quarter of this year, that percentage climbed to nearly 52%. Six years ago, nearly 29% of DG customers cross-shopped at Kroger. This year, that percentage fell off to just 17%.
Dollar General’s footprint remains strongest in the South, where it accounted for one in five visits to grocery stores in 2025. But the chain’s fastest grocery visit growth is occurring elsewhere.
Between 2019 and 2025, its grocery visit share climbed by over four points in the Midwest and more than three points in the Northeast. And despite Dollar General’s relatively limited presence in the West, it nearly doubled its grocery visit share over the same period.
“Location analytics reveal that Dollar General’s growth has been fueled largely by its dominance in short visits – in-and-out trips lasting less than 10 minutes for essentials like milk, bread, eggs, or snacks,” noted Placer.ai’s content manager Lila Margalit.
The dollar store chain with more than 20,000 locations across the United States and Mexico now accounts for 28% of all under-10-minute visits to its locations, traditional grocery stores, and value grocery stores. This is a sharp increase from the 24% short visit share posted by DG in Q2 2019.
Dollar General's share of visits lasting longer than 10 minutes also grew over the past six years, but these still account for just 10% of combined Dollar General and grocery visits.
“These trends underscore how Dollar General has solidified its role as a quick-stop destination, carving out a niche that complements, rather than fully replaces, the traditional grocery trip,” Margalit said.
