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There were. The problem is that Walmart moved in and drove them all out of business, then realized that the market wasn't big enough and closed the stores leaving nothing.

Small stores in rural areas are overpriced, understocked, regularly have expired products, and often close around 6pm. I've literally ran into store owners in Walmart who buy things there and just mark them up 2-3x. But to be fair, they really have no other options unless they drive a couple hundred miles.

DG pops up in extremely rural areas that no real store wants to go, not even gas stations. I know several in towns of 100-200 people that are 40-50 miles from anything resembling a town.

It seems that grocery stores are consolidating into the big chains. We had a couple of IGA[1] grocery stores in the town I grew up in - locally owned and operated grocery stores that were much more responsive to customer demands. Now there are none.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IGA_(supermarkets)