Dollar Store Demise

With much publicity, Dollar Tree announced an across the board quarter mark-up to all items.  Some are worth 25 cents more, like the low dose Nature Garden Sleep Aid that prompted my visit but I couldn't find.  Other items probably aren't worth the dollar.  Pundits place the shoppers in two genres.  One group are people trying to get by who just cannot spend supermarket prices on certain staples, school supplies, snacks, and OTC remedies.  Others are people like me with ample funds who just enjoy puttering around, selecting bargains with no restraint, and counting the total as I go.  

This visit rather alienated me.  Profit margins must be strained, cashiers at a minimum with no self-cashier, shelves empty, an image of grunge with toiletries and OTC section strewn across the shelves.  Snacks, which I shouldn't be eating, no longer included the small boxes of cheap pastries, replaced by those two-packs of cake or buns that you get at the gas stations during road trip stops.  No longer bargain.  No longer fun.