LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — In early 2024, Dollar Tree announced plans to close 600 Family Dollar stores nationwide during the first half of this year, after first merging back in 2015.
"We are pleased to announce we have completed our acquisition of Family Dollar, and we formally welcome the Family Dollar team to the Dollar Tree organization," said Bob Sasser, former Chief Executive Officer.
Hearing the words "closing down" or "shutting down" has had consumers in Arkansas wondering how that could impact them.
Steve Goode, the Executive Director for the Arkansas Grocers Retail Merchants Association explained how he doesn't expect Arkansas to be impacted by the closures just yet.
"What we're waiting on is to see just what locations, if any close. Maybe no locations [will] close in Arkansas and consumers here aren't affected," he said. "But I think until we see that list it's just kind of a waiting game to see how the rest of the retail community will react and see how it'll affect consumers and local communities."
He explained that stores open and close all the time and that it's a part of the nature of the retail business. However, closing hundreds at a time could have a downside.
"I think just the sheer volume of the amount on the announcement is kind of what surprised the retail community. When these dollar stores close, then it could create a food desert or could create a retail location desert," Goode described.
Food deserts are something that has been a focus for Kathy Webb, city director for Ward 3 in Little Rock. Both Webb and the Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance have been busy working on a plan to solve the crisis.
"It's a big problem. All 75 counties in Arkansas have food deserts and the City of Little Rock is getting ready to send out a proposal for a vendor to operate a mobile grocery store," Webb said."I think if we get that up and running that would be a model that other cities in the state can look at."
Until then, Dollar Tree, Inc. is working to avoid more closures in what it calls the early stages of the "transformation journey."
In a recent statement following the announcement, Chief Executive Officer Rick Dreiling said: "We are accelerating our multi-price rollout at Dollar Tree and taking decisive action to improve profitability and unlock value at Family Dollar."
The closures are expected to happen over the next few years. On top of the hundreds of Family Dollar stores closing, the company is also closing 30 Dollar Tree locations.