Residents of Pine Hollow, Oregon, barely had time to recover from the ribbon-cutting of their 7th Dollar General before town officials announced the construction of store #8—directly across the street. The decision, described by Mayor Tom Wilkins as “inevitable,” was met with mixed reactions, ranging from shrugs of acceptance to mild confusion.
“We thought seven was enough,” said local resident Diane McAllister, shaking her head as she clutched a plastic bag filled with off-brand Doritos and a seasonal garden gnome. “But then I realized… what if I need another bag of rubber bands and a bottle of lemon-scented floor cleaner while I’m at the other end of town? This just makes sense.”
The announcement was made during a hastily scheduled town hall meeting in the backroom of Pine Hollow’s second-largest Dollar General. Mayor Wilkins, flanked by town council members and a Dollar General representative, assured attendees that this was just the next logical step.
“We’ve already got one by the freeway, one by the post office, one next to the feed store, two within shouting distance of each other near Main Street, one in the abandoned Pizza Hut, and of course, the new one inside the old Dairy Queen,” Wilkins explained. “And folks, I’ll be honest—we’re just gonna keep going.”
He then unfurled a map revealing a bold new vision for Pine Hollow, featuring a dozen more potential Dollar General sites, including one in the town park, another inside the fire station, and a “Super Dollar General” planned for the site of the soon-to-be-demolished elementary school.
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Dollar General corporate representative Cheryl Blevins expressed her excitement for the expansion, stating that Pine Hollow was the perfect town for this level of market saturation.
“We believe that every resident should be no more than 30 seconds away from a pack of discount AA batteries or a suspiciously cheap pregnancy test,” Blevins said, adjusting her company-branded blazer. “This town clearly shares our values.”
Opponents of the plan, like longtime resident Frank Dobbs, argue that the town might be losing its identity. “There used to be a hardware store here,” Dobbs said, pointing toward the original Dollar General. “Now, if I need a hammer, my choices are a pink plastic kids’ toy or one that looks like it might explode in my hands. What happened to us?”
But for every critic, there are two people like Carla Stevens, who has fully embraced the Dollar General lifestyle. “It’s just convenient,” she admitted while loading her trunk with $8 worth of random junk she didn’t need. “And you never know when you’ll need a 2-liter of off-brand Mountain Dew and a single lightbulb.”
Construction on the 8th location is expected to begin next month, with Mayor Wilkins teasing a potential 9th store to follow “as soon as we find some room.” Sources say the local Dairy Queen, recently converted into store #7, is already being eyed for a relocation to make way for a bigger Dollar General that can accommodate an additional aisle of suspiciously off-brand cereal.
For now, Pine Hollow residents can rest easy knowing that wherever they go, a Dollar General will be there, waiting for them with open doors, eerily empty parking lots, and a slightly sticky linoleum floor.
