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Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

theguardian.com

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Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#451

Post by cwmoore »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #441
regera wrote: post #116

Dollar stores are private equity with a checkout lane. In 2025, Dollar Tree sold Family Dollar to a group of private-equity firms: Brigade Capital Management, Macellum Capital Management and Arkhouse Management Co. https://corporate.dollartree.com/news-media/press-releases/d... It’s a business model cosplaying as poverty relief while quietly siphoning money from the people least able to lose it. They already run on a…

Here's how shitty of a business person I am: I had no idea that the poor were a "market" you could prey upon. Somehow I thought that if I presented a business plan that began, "Our target audience are those living paycheck to paycheck…" that I would be quickly shown the door.

Paid For By Poor Folks (PFBPF)

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#452

Post by estearum »

esseph wrote: post #447
estearum wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure GP was suggesting a general enforcement framework, not talking about any particular company. Anyway no, shareholders care about much more than simple profits.

Explain, please. I ask because I've never invested in a company that wasn't very profitable. I'm trying to find out besides intense insider information why someone would. (I'm not VC clearly, just a retail investor.)

Explain how people care about more than just profitability?

If they didn't, everyone would be invested in the single most profitable company on the market, which they're not.

There are unprofitable companies people are perfectly willing to buy.

Growth, absolute revenue, rates of rates of change are all relevant depending on what you care about.

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#453

Post by margalabargala »

gruez wrote: post #275
youarentrightjr wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see these private equity takes on HN frequently and am really baffled by the ignorance. There's a very clear difference between a public and private company - the fiduciary duty to shareholders. There is a legal requirement for directors of public companies to act in the financial interests of all shareholders. In practice, and according to precedent, this means long term viability of the company, in other words, a…

>There is a legal requirement for directors of public companies to act in the financial interests of all shareholders. In practice, and according to precedent, this means long term viability of the company, in other words, a sustained profitable business. All that means is that controlling shareholders can't use the company as a piggy bank and raid it to fund their other ventures. It doesn't mean the business has to…

Yes, that's the major difference between the public and PE companies that OP was highlighting. The owners of a public company can't raid it to fund other ventures. They have to sell it off to someone else to do that.

Selling off a public company like that is generally not trivial and is not surprise sprung on shareholders.

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#455

Post by hedora »

underlipton wrote: post #397
jefftk wrote: post #372

> Red Baron frozen pizzas, listed on the shelf at $5, rang up at $7.65. Bounty paper towels, shelf price $10.99, rang up at $15.50. This very rarely happens in MA, because when it does the store has to give you the item for $10 off, including if that makes it free. And they have to post a sign at the register explaining the law, which means when you're invoking it all you need to do is point at the sign. https://www.…

It's different in different states. In Maryland, once a complaint is filed with the relevant authority, the store has a certain number of days to correct pricing. Most retailers will give you the misprice if it's clearly their fault in not changing the tags, as a matter of policy. The confusion around this law is quite frustrating, though. Quite a few customers think they're entitled to not just prices on tags that h…

Is it a certain number of days to fix all the mispriced items?

If not, there’s an obvious loophole here. Misprice intentionally, then stop purchasing the item from your distributor if you get called on it, rotating in some similar thing. Later, bring it back with a different sku, or mispriced at some other level.

This would work well for dollar stores, which are optimized to spread in / sustain food/retail deserts.

The store is often literally the only option in town. The wouldn’t even need to sell excess warehouse inventory at the advertised price, since they could just shift supply to another state (or county/store, depending on how poorly the law is worded).

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#456

Post by massysett »

andrew_lettuce wrote: post #318
pclmulqdq wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody in this comment chain was saying it was good for the customers. The GP was saying that they clear out room for new businesses, and if brick-and-mortar-fabric-superstore were still a viable model someone would be doing it.

How the hell does consolidation, monopolization, externalizing costs and extreme leverage "clear the room for new businesses"? Even on HN playing the role of PE apologist is not going to fly ...

Consolidation frees up real estate, allowing new businesses to open. Where I live, old supermarkets are now farmers’ markets, trampoline parks, and health clubs, and an old car dealership is a church.

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#457

Post by hedora »

rtp4me wrote: post #437
jeltz wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was investigated, the issue is that the fines are smaller than the profit. I would personally want to see things like this considered fraud and that it can result in prison sentences for executives and other people invovled in the decision making.

You want prison sentences for execs if you were charged $1.50 for a can of corn instead of $1.45? Surely you can't be serious.

If there’s a paper trail showing they authorized it, and the total amount of fraud is enough for felony charges (a few thousand bucks, I think), then yeah, throw their asses in prison, and make them refund the money they had the business steal out of their personal funds.

I’m all for limited liability corporations, but if there is a smoking gun that shows you intentionally engaged in criminal activity, that should pierce the liability shield.

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#458

Post by Waterluvian »

cyberax wrote: post #367
joncp wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... and a car to haul all that stuff, and time to drive to the nearest Costco. It really is a luxury that a ton of people can't afford.

Why is car a luxury? A clunker car worth $2000 will still work fine for years with minor maintenance that can be done by yourself. Oh, yeah. Cities. Cars are expensive when you live in a 100 sq. ft. box. Perhaps that's what is causing problems?

A competently planned city makes car ownership unnecessary.

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#459

Post by youarentrightjr »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #421
youarentrightjr wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why bring up Revlon duties when as you say, their relevance is only during company acquisition or restructuring? It's well established over hundreds of years of case law that directors of public companies have to act in good faith to benefit the company (and therefore, the shareholders). Weird cherry pick.

> Why bring up Revlon duties when as you say, their relevance is only during company acquisition or restructuring? It’s an exception that proves the rule. In that specific case, what you’re saying applies. In all others, it does not. > It's well established over hundreds of years of case law Where are you getting this from? > directors of public companies have to act in good faith to benefit the company (and therefor…

> Where are you getting this from?

I seriously doubt you're operating sincerely in this thread, given your ability to cite Revlon. But on the off chance, start here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co.

> And nothing about public companies says they can’t be structured in a way that sometimes undermines some shareholders.

See above.

Re: Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices

#460

Post by greycol »

rtp4me wrote: post #437
jeltz wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was investigated, the issue is that the fines are smaller than the profit. I would personally want to see things like this considered fraud and that it can result in prison sentences for executives and other people invovled in the decision making.

You want prison sentences for execs if you were charged $1.50 for a can of corn instead of $1.45? Surely you can't be serious.

If you really believe 5 cent transactions never amount to significant consequences why don't you send me 5 cents a million times.
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