Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar: Who wins? [2024]

Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar: Dollar stores and supermarkets are well-known chains of supermarkets, variety stores, etc, all across the US. As mentioned in their titles, these stores promise to deliver high-quality items at the lowest price, charging you only a couple of dollars for branded products.

Yet, due to the names and the products and categories they offer, many people think that they offer the majority of the services same or similar. But in reality, there is a clear difference between their prices, a few of their services, and offerings overall.

Talking about you, if you are one among those who don’t know the difference between Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and Family Dollar and wish to learn which among these is cheaper and a better option to shop from, then we are delighted to inform you that the article mentioned below contains an unbiased and updated comparison between Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar. 

Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar: Overview 

Dollar General

Dollar General is an American chain of variety stores operating more than 18,000 stores all across the continental US. With Dollar General, you get to shop for everyday necessities and items offered by the most popular and trusted brands in the country at low prices.

Dollar General claims to offer you good services through all its convenient location and online means – the website and app. 

Here, you get to shop from a good set of categories including events, seasonal, personal care, health, food, beverage, electronics, toys, beauty, office supplies, school supplies, cleaning, party, occasions, auto, hardware, baby, etc along with exclusive DG brands.

Dollar Tree

Dollar Tree, with its parent company Dollar Tree Inc, has a hold over more dollar subsidiary companies including Family Dollar. Like other dollar supermarkets, Dollar Tree is also a multi-price-point chain of discount variety shops. 

Dollar Tree is well-known when you want to shop for items in bulk for various reasons including businesses, schools, parties, restaurants, etc. It operates over 15,000 stores across the 48 US states and Canada with over 24 distribution centers nationwide, serving you through all the locations along with its website and app.

At Dollar Tree, you can find a good collection of departments to shop from including food, candy, drinks, health, personal care, home, office, kitchen, home decor, toys, crafts, holidays, seasons, and celebrations.

Family Dollar

Family Dollar is said to be the closest store to dollar stores. It is a general discount and dollar store where you can find branded items for lower prices compared to other local supermarkets and shops.

Family Dollar has weekly as well as digital coupons with multiple deals to help you save more, and buy more while staying within the limits of your budget. It is best to shop for groceries and regular necessities, but also has some exclusive collections for holidays and special occasions.

At Family Dollar, you get to see departments such as ads, books, bed supplies, seasonal, party, bed, body, beauty, snacks, beverages, home, office, cleaning, etc. And it has a special section where you can shop for all the items under huge deals, and discount offers going up to 40% to 50% off on regular days

Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar: Price

Prices are the primary topic when it comes to supermarkets and malls like Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and Family Dollar. Although they have dollars in their names, and people assume they have all the products from high-end brands at just one or two dollars – that is not the real case.

All of them do offer good quality products from popular brands but, there is still a difference in prices for various products from different categories, and diverse locations of the stores. 

To give you a better idea of what we are talking about, we have given a price comparison table including all the regular necessities of people from the three stores, as follows:

Products	Dollar General	Dollar Tree	Family Dollar
Health and wellness – Vitamins, Eye care, and	Starts from $1, $1.50, and $1	Starts from $1.25, $1.25, and $1.25	Starts from $1, $1.50, and $1
Office and school supplies – back to school, Office desk accessories, and Folders & binders	Start from $1, $0.75, and $1	Starts from $1.25, $1.25, and $1.25	Starts from $1, $1, and $1
Cleaning – Cleaning cloth, Air fresheners, and laundry care	Starts from $1, $1, and $2	Starts from $1.25, $1.25, and $1.25	Starts from $2.25, $1, and $1
Beauty – Cosmetic tools and Skincare	Starts from $1 and $1.35	Starts from $1.25 and $1.25	Starts from $1 and $1
Food and beverage –	Start from $0.25	Start from $1.25	Starts from $1.25

As you can see, Dollar General seems to be having lower prices than others in the majority of the sections. The difference between the prices is merely a few cents to one dollar accordingly.

But, in case you are going to buy a lot of things from these brands, for instance, all the things you would need in the upcoming week or month – then the difference between the prices from all the three will make a big difference.

Apart from that, there are many products that they show on the website and app but are only available to purchase through their stores. Along with this, you also need to know that the prices of these products vary according to the quantity along with your area and store.

Nevertheless, all – Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and Family Dollar have cheaper prices than other similar brands. 

Winner: All

Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar: Locations

Dollar General

Dollar General has more than 18,000 stores spread wide in 47 US states. It has over 15 distribution centers across 16 US states and the only states without any Dollar General stores are – Montana, Hawaii, and Alaska.

Also, among the 18,779 general retail stores in the US, the most Dollar General locations are in Texas with 1755 stores. It basically makes 9% of all the Dollar General retail stores in the nation.

Dollar Tree

Dollar Tree has over 15,000 stores as of February 2020 globally, among which, 7897 Dollar Tree locations are in the US, as for the analysis of January 2024. 

Most of the Dollar Tree stores in the US are in the south and northeast parts. The US has 48 states out of 50 with Dollar Tree locations, with most of them located in the region of Arizona, with 296 stores, about 1.90% of total Dollar Tree locations overall.

Family Dollar 

Family Dollar has over 8000 stores overall. Among these, most Family Dollar retail stores are located in Texas with 1130 stores, about 14% of the overall Family Dollar locations. 

It is followed by Florida with 573, about 7% of the total stores, and Ohio with 453 locations, about 5% of the overall Family Dollar retail stores.

Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar: What’s the Difference?

Stores	Dollar General	Dollar Tree	Family Dollar
Locations	It has 18,779 stores in 47 states.	It has 15,288 stores in 48 states.	It has 8200 stores.
Quantity and Variety	Offers good quality products since they come from trusted brands. Has a good variety and popular alternatives.	Quality is good since the product comes from popular brands, and the variety range is good too.	Quality is good because the products are from popular and trusted brands, but there is not much to see in variety.
Price	Prices are the lowest compared to Dollar Tree and Family Dollar mostly.	Prices seem to be higher than $0.25 and such compared to Dollar General and Family Dollar.	Prices are mostly similar to Dollar General, cheaper than Dollar Tree by $0.25 to $.75 cents mostly.
Discount Offers	Offers a couple of promotional deals, weekly deals, and such but clearance sales and sales rarely arrive.	Offers a couple of promotional deals regularly, similar to Dollar General. Clearance sales and different sales can only be seen at the time of festivals and occasions.	Doesn't offer many promotional deals regularly, but has clearance sales and different sales occasionally where you can get the majority of the products at half of their original price.

Which Dollar Store is the Best? 

We are going to start with the prices. Prices play the foremost role when it comes to shopping from dollar markets. People are confused as to which among these offers the cheapest products.

But, although you can see that the Dollar General store and Family Dollar seem to have similar and cheaper prices, cheaper than Dollar Tree, there are times when Dollar Tree has clearance sales and multiple offers to help you save more. 

Also, shopping from Dollar Tree, especially for one or two products will just make a difference of a few cents or a couple of dollars, so it won't cost you a lot.

Now, talking about the categories and departments, all three, Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and Family Dollar offer similar categories and departments. The same goes for quality products as all three deliver products from popular brands.

Regardless, when it comes to variety, Dollar General and Dollar Tree have good variety and alternatives in case you didn’t find the product you were looking for, but Family Dollar might have a little bit of a shortage in variety.

In simple words, you can find something else in place of what you wanted to buy originally from Dollar General and Dollar Tree, but that’s not the same case when you shop from Family Dollar mostly.

Final Words

With all the points highlighted above and in the whole article, according to us, all the dollar stores are worth giving a try. 

However, just when you are tight on budget and you have a whole list of products to buy, then we will suggest you go for either Dollar General or Family Dollar. In case of more variety, Dollar General is your ultimate destination.

With this, we have ended our comparison battle between Dollar General vs Dollar Tree vs Family Dollar, and hope it is now clear to you which among Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and Family Dollar is cheaper and a better option for you.

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