Dollar General Corporation (a) Abridged

Abstract

Condensed version of UVA-BP-0253

Excerpt

UVA-BP-0388

DOLLAR GENERAL CORPORATION (A) ABRIDGED

In February 1984, Cal Turner, Jr., 44‑year‑old president of Dollar General Corporation, was finally looking forward to returning to business as usual after the hectic pace of the past few months. The company had been understaffed even before the 1983 acquisition of 280 Hirsch stores from Interco, Inc. Now, just as the conversion of these stores to DG stores was on schedule, Interco was offering to sell DG another chain.

Company Background

Dollar General's roots stretched back to when J.L. Turner, Cal Jr.'s grandfather, quit school at age 11 to help support his widowed mother and three younger siblings living on a small, mortgaged farm. In his mid‑20s, J.L. went to work for a grocery and dry‑goods wholesaler. As J.L. traveled the small towns of Tennessee and Kentucky during a time “when everybody's belly was flat up against their backbone,” a fellow merchant suggested to him that the depression was forcing near-bankrupt retailers to sell their inventories for next to nothing. So J.L. began taking out short-term bank loans of $ 2,000 or $ 3,000 and buying complete inventories from hard-up merchants. He would sell the merchandise as quickly as possible and repay the bank, usually within 30 days. Financing was easy because depression-era banks were starved for good loans.

J.L.'s son, Cal Turner (Sr.) was equally suited for retailing. A February 2, 1968, article in The Louisville Courier-Journal noted that, before he had graduated from Scottsville High School, Cal Sr. was already a storekeeper:

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