Dollar General X Store Opening in The Valley

by Ima Phibber

In the South and in Mississippi, there are more Dollar General stores than you can shake a stick at. They are everywhere! In recent years, they have started popping up in rural areas in the middle of nowhere in some cases. They are very convenient, and they carry just about anything you need. However, many people and investors have complained that they cater to low-end consumers, and many have said they need to up their game and offer more items for high-end consumers. Dollar General has answered the bell.

Dollar General has created a new line of stores called Dollar General X or DGX, and Valley City will have one on Hwy. 31. The X stands for Extra. These news stores will help Dollar General attract more high-end consumers. The X stores will have a small coffee shop and sitting area very similar to Targets that have Starbucks inside them. The coffee shops will be called DG Drip. These X stores will even carry Dollar General branded coffee. They will also carry more upscale brands as well including Hey Dood, Lululime, Southern Tyde, and many more. A wine and cheese area will be in the new X stores as well.

Dollar General spokesperson Dee Gentral said, “We’re very excited about our new X stores, and we felt The Valley was a great place to put one of our new X stores because of the recent growth. Our aim is to attract more high-end consumers, and we also hope shoppers will come in and stay a while. We hope they’ll hang out, drink some coffee, and have a better shopping experience. Many people are in and out of our stores as quickly as possible, but we hope to change that with our X stores. The longer people stay, the more money they generally spend.”

In addition, the X stores should very clean. They will use robots to clean the stores, and they will also use robots to check inventory. They will also be fully staffed; each X store will have at least 3 employees present at all times. Additionally, each X store will have at least one fully functional self-checkout kiosk. I talked to multiple Dollar General shoppers, and I got mixed feelings about the new DGX stores.

One shopper said, “I shop at Dollar General because it’s convenient, but I don’t see how these DGX stores are gonna do well. We don’t have a lot of high-end shoppers around here. Plus, who wants to drink coffee and hangout in DG? I don’t. I wanna get in and get out as soon as possible. Plus, the old guys will probably take over the coffee shop, and nobody is gonna wanna hang around those old farts. I hope it does well, but I doubt it.”

Another shopper said, “I’m so pumped about the new DGX store! My friends and I will have a place to hangout and drink coffee now. That’s so cool. My parents have been pushing me to get a job after dropping out of college, and I think I may apply to be a barista at the new store. It’s so exciting!”

Will the new DGX concept work in Valley City? We’ll see, but it is great that they picked The Valley and Valley City to put one of their new stores. We’ll be there for the grand opening in a few weeks.