Dollar Tree Thesis

Revenues, profit and high gross margins combined with a sound control on company expenses and a wealthy cash flow report

The Dollar Tree Inc., is a chain of discount variety stores that sells items for $1 or less based in the United States. Based in Chesapeake, Virginia United States, it is one of the most popular and most successful single-price-point retailer chains in the US.

Dollar General was founded in Scottsville, Kentucky in 1939 and was originally called J.L. Turner and Son Wholesale, then Turner’s Department Store, and then in 1955 it was converted to Dollar General and did not sell any item over $1. Dollar General was the originator of the dollar store concept and in 1968 it became a publicly traded company. “Dollar General is a Fortune 500® company and the leader in the dollar store segment, with more than 8,000 stores and $9.2 billion in fiscal 2006 sales” (www.dollargeneral.com). Dollar General is in the discount retail store industry and focuses on cost leadership. Its direct competitors are Family Dollar Stores, Fred’s Inc., and Dollar Tree. In this industry, maintaining low costs are crucial to generating profits, since the merchandise is already being sold at a discount and there is such high

Dollar Tree is a national brand chain of discount stores selling every item for $1.00. Founded by K.R. Perry in 1953 known as Ben Franklin later renamed to 5& 10. However, in 1993 owners Macon Brock, Doug Perry, and Ray Compton renamed the store to Dollar Tree Stores (DollarTree.com). Listed as a Fortune 200 company, The Dollar Tree is headquartered in Chesapeake, Virginia and operates over 14,000 stores throughout the United States. It supports its stores by utilizing a nationwide logistics network of nine distribution centers located throughout the U.S.

The internal analysis is very important in a company. Just like the external analysis, both of these analysis help to determine strategies. The Internal analysis involves the strengths, weaknesses, opportunity and threats of a company (Pearson, 2014). Dollar Tree has many strengths but they also have some weakness too. If Dollar Tree would use the data that they have from their internal analysis they could turn a lot of their weakness into strengths. But we will talk about their weaknesses later. The more strength a company has the better. One of Dollar Tree’s strengths would be that they acquired Family Dollar in 2015. This is a huge strength for Dollar Tree. Dollar Tree has many opportunities to overtake the dollar store market. They only need to keep inquiring their competitor’s stores. Strength for Dollar Tree is their strong financial performance. They are the largest dollar store in the market. Dollar Tree has a $15.5B Annual net sale that grew to 80.2% in 2015 and exceeded $15 billion for the first time in Company history. Now to Dollar Tree’s weaknesses, this would be their low inventory turnover ratio. In 2016, Dollar Tree reported that their inventory turnover ratio was 3.8 (Canadean, 2016). This is a high number. This is saying that they have more than enough of inventory in store that is not being bought by their customers. This is really money that is setting in their warehouse or stockroom and it just sitting and is not being used. This is bad for Dollar Tree.

Dollar Tree is based out of Chesapeake, Virginia and operates as the largest and most successful single-price-point retailer in North America (Dollar Tree, 2016). Notably, they operate their stores in 48 states within the United States and five within Canada (Parnell, 2014). Moreover, as the nation's leading discount variety store they sell everything for $1 or less (Sharma, 2015).

On the website that I found this article there was a chart comparing dollar stores to grocery stores, convenient stores, drug stores, supermarkets warehouse clubs, and mass merchandisers. This chart shows that the dollar stores have the highest percentage rating for being convenient to their customers. One of the major reasons for this is because there are so many dollar stores. There are probably several located near your home or work place. Another reason is from the changes that I mentioned earlier. They are becoming more of a one stop store with all of the products you need, instead of just a dollar

Dollar Tree, Inc. is the world’s leading operator of the One Dollar variety stores. “The Company also offers value merchandise at prices above $1 at its 219 Deals stores and at prices of $1.25 CAD at its 210 stores in Canada. Overall, Dollar Tree operates more than 5,300 stores across the 48 contiguous United States and five Canadian Provinces, supported by a coast-to-coast logistics network and more than 90,000 associates. A Fortune 500 Company, Dollar Tree has served North America for more than twenty-eight years” (Annual Report Com, 2015). Dollar Tree’s Net sales for the second quarter of 2015 was $3.01 which is an increase from $2.03 billion in the year 2014 second quarter. Dollars Trees total liabilities and

There are numerous stores that fall into this category around the United States including a west coast competitor 99 Cents Only stores that has continued to grow. Until the Dollar Tree fully determines the ongoing plan for its traditional stores and the recent acquired Family Dollar locations, I believe that the Dollar Tree now operates in two separate groups one above the $1.00 threshold and one below. The traditional Dollar Tree stores have begun to lose profits as emphasis on cost reductions have been overshadowed by the acquisition. As of right now, it does not appear to be determined if the Dollar Tree will continue to operate in each of the segment groups of if future alignment is

The dollar store customer is a complex individual. According to Businessweek, through the use of a product which tracks where consumers shop, those who frequent the dollar store are not necessarily who you think they are. This study showed that individuals who shopped at ‘true’ dollar stores were the same ones who frequented other outlets including Trader Joe’s, Panera Bread, and

Dollar Tree is an American chain of discounted items in many varieties that sells for$1 or less. They are the largest single priced retailer. Dollar Tree carries items that are used as consumable, variety categories and seasonal. You can shop at any Dollar Tree and find items such as health and beauty care, household consumables, home decor, office and school supplies, party supplies, toys, floral supplies, kitchenware and cutlery, and seasonal merchandise, paper products and chemicals products, candy, food and frozen and refrigerated foods, and soft lines. Dollar Tree has everything you need for every day, every holiday, and every occasion. Dollar Tree is so large that they have a total of 4,992 stores in the 48 States and has 10 distribution centers across the US. There is probably a Dollar Tree right down the road from where you stay. Dollar Tree is very considerate of their customers. They want to make sure that when the customers come into the store to shop that they are having fun while doing so. They understand about placing their customers’ and shareholders needs and want first to better position themselves in the future and to keep ahead of their competitors. Dollar Tree has a strong market position because it is the largest single priced retailer that makes as strong as they are, and with the integration of the Family Dollars stores, Dollar Tree future is looking mighty bright. Dollar Tree wants to continue to improve in their sales year after year. After the

Dollar stores draw you by having small stores with big sale signs in them. Put them in a big store, they wouldn't pop out as much, but in a small store they look bigger. Add to that the packed high shelves that make customers want to look around and find better deals. These signs pry on customer's impulse. A person may think looking at a

They were number one in the year of 2000 and by the year of 2010, they had opened 4,000 locations including outside of the United States. Dollar Tree had the opportunity to take over 86 of Canadian Dollar Giant Stores that was located in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Nonetheless, Dollar Tree acknowledges its market power; its competitors, Wal-Mart, Dollar General, and Family Dollar have an uphill battle to reach Dollar Tree business model. Moreover, Dollar Tree product differentiation gives them an additional leverage over their competitors. As mention earlier, Dollar Tree sells its entire product for $1 or less. They accomplish this by purchasing a variety of products from private vendors at wholesale prices. In contrast, its competitors purchase brand name products at higher prices, thus making it difficult to compete with Dollar Tree prices. These are the way Dollar Tree utilized to map, scan,

Currently, Dollar Tree has found itself a niche in the retail market by offering products that usually cost more than one dollar or less. From a consumer perspective, this is an ideal position to be in, because it places a consumer in a position where he or she does not have to search for the best bargain, it is readily available from this organization’s store chain. Therefore, the products from this company grabs the attention of consumers due to low cost pricing.