Is Walmart open or closed on Memorial Day 2025? Here's what you need to know
Is Walmart open or closed on Memorial Day 2025? Here's what you need to know
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Army soldiers place Memorial Day flags in Arlington National Cemetery
The Old Guard placed about 260,000 flags at the gravestones of service members and their families at Arlington National Cemetery for Memorial Day.
Memorial Day has arrived, signaling the unofficial start of the summer season.
The holiday, which falls on Monday, May 26 this year, commemorates those who have died while serving in the U.S. military.
Many national retailers, grocery stores and restaurant chains will be open on Memorial Day, however, banks and post offices will be closed.
If you need to make a quick and last-minute trip to the store to pick up something for your Memorial Day gathering, Walmart will be an option for you this year, as the company told USA TODAY its stores will be open regular hours on the day. Most Walmart stores are open daily from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. local time.
Here's what to know about other retail and grocery store chains and whether or not they'll be open on Memorial Day.
Are grocery stores open on Memorial Day?
In addition to Walmart, the following grocery stores will be open on May 26. Hours are listed for the companies that provided them.
Sam's Club; Open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. for Plus members and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. for Club members
Most stores in the Kroger family of companies (Baker's, City Market, Dillons, Food 4 Less, Foods Co, Fred Meyer, Fry's, Gerbes, Jay C Food Store, King Soopers, Kroger, Mariano's, Metro Market, Pay-Less Super Markets, Pick'n Save, QFC, Ralphs, Ruler, Smith's Food and Drug).
Trader Joe's
Food Lion
Publix
Aldi
Whole Foods
Wegmans
Meijer; 6 a.m. to midnight
Harris Teeter
A majority of Albertson's banner stores will be open on Easter (Safeway, Albertsons, Jewel-Osco, ACME, Vons and Tom Thumb).
Lidl
Giant Eagle
Harveys
Winn-Dixie
H-E-B
Costco warehouses will be closed on Memorial Day, according to the company's website.
Are retail stores open on Memorial Day?
In addition to Walmart, retail stores listed below will be open on May 26. Hours are listed for the companies that provided them.
Home Depot
Lowe's
Ace Hardware
Best Buy; 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Sephora
Bass Pro Shop; 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Cabela's; 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
REI; 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.
IKEA
Petco
PetSmart; 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Tractor Supply Company; 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Target
TJ Maxx
Marshall's
HomeGoods
Lowe's
Macy's
Kohl's
JCPenney
Belk; 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Burlington
Office Depot; 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
OfficeMax; 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Gabe Hauari is a national trending news reporter at USA TODAY. You can follow him on X @GabeHauari or email him at Gdhauari@gannett.com.
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USA Today
30 minutes ago
- USA Today
Appeals Court allows Trump to keep tariffs while appeal plays out
Appeals Court allows Trump to keep tariffs while appeal plays out | The Excerpt On Friday's episode of The Excerpt podcast: USA TODAY White House Reporter Zac Anderson has the latest on the trade whiplash around President Donald Trump's tariffs. A group of Deaf Americans is suing over a lack of sign language interpreters for White House events. USA TODAY Senior Congress & Campaigns Reporter Riley Beggin takes a look at some provisions lurking in the GOP tax bill Americans should know about. Heavy smoke is expected to hit the U.S. as Canadian wildfires force evacuations. Faizan Zaki pulls off a dramatic win at the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending an email to podcasts@ Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text. Podcasts: True crime, in-depth interviews and more USA TODAY podcasts right here Taylor Wilson: Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson, and today is Friday, May 30th, 2025. This is The Excerpt. Today, the latest on tariffs after some court moves this week, plus a group of deaf Americans is suing Trump over a lack of sign language interpreters for White House events. We take a closer look at some lurking provisions in the GOP tax bill. ♦ Tariffs as imposed by President Donald Trump will continue for now. I spoke with USA TODAY White House reporter Zac Anderson about the latest chapter of trade whiplash. Hey there, Zac. Zac Anderson: Howdy. Taylor Wilson: All right, so starting with this, what did this appeals court decide? Zac Anderson: So the appeals court temporarily put on hold a ruling by a lower court that had blocked Trump from implementing his tariffs. Trump was trying to use a emergency powers law that was enacted in 1977 to implement these tariffs without going through Congress. He had declared a state of emergency, and this trade court had ruled that he couldn't use this law to push his tariffs, which have really been the centerpiece of his economic agenda. The Trump administration immediately appealed that ruling, and less than 24 hours later, the appeals court said, "We're going to allow you to continue to levy these tariffs while this appeal plays out." So really a lot of quick back and forth here, but the tariffs remain in place for now. Taylor Wilson: Well, this wasn't the only move in court. How else have the courts been intervening over Tariffs Act? Zac Anderson: Two court rulings went against Trump on tariffs this week. One was the ruling that I just mentioned from a trade court. That case had been brought by a number of state officials and also some businesses. Trump's use of the tariffs was deemed invalid in that case. And then there was another lawsuit filed by a pair of toy companies in Illinois that had challenged the tariffs that Trump imposed. 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Well, all eyes have been on the markets both domestically and really around the world since these tariffs were first announced a few weeks ago. How are markets reacting now this week, Zac? Zac Anderson: So after the tariffs were paused, you saw a little bit of a spike in the markets. Obviously, the threat of tariffs has led to some concerns about how that would affect the economy. There's been talk that that could increase chances of recession. U.S. stocks really showed little reaction to the appeals court decision having already pulled back from the rally sparked on Wednesday and Wall Street closed higher on Thursday, shrugging off the decision by the Federal Appeals Court. So I think the markets are still kind of taking a wait-and-see approach. Taylor Wilson: Well, Peter Navarro, the White House trade adviser, spoke with reporters after the appeals court ruling. Let's give a listen. Peter Navarro: Even if we lose, we will do it another way. And I can assure you American people, that the Trump tariff agenda is a alive, well, healthy and will be implemented to protect you, to save your jobs and your factories, and to stop ship and foreign wealth, our wealth into foreign hands. Taylor Wilson: Well, Zac, I want to ask you to predict the future, but what's next perhaps for this trade whiplash conversation going forward? Zac Anderson: Well, there's other court cases out there, so there could be other court rulings that impact this, but it does seem like this is going all the way up to the Supreme Court. Obviously, depending on what the appeals court decides, this is going to be a battle for a while now until the Supreme Court brings some certainty to this. I think we're going to see a lot of back and forth on this for some time to come. Taylor Wilson: All right, Zac Anderson covers the White House for USA TODAY. Thanks, Zac. 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Riley Beggin: Thank you. eclaircissement Taylor Wilson: Thousands of people in Canada are being evacuated as active wildfires have charred hundreds of thousands of acres in the country, officials said. The blazes also threaten to waft heavy smoke over the Northern U.S. Some Americans could face poor air quality from the fires as soon as today. Active blazes have burned nearly 700,000 acres in Saskatchewan and nearly 200,000 acres in Manitoba, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Center. A total of nearly 1.5 million acres have burned across the two provinces so far this year, according to the fire center. Smoke from the blazes is expected to fall heavily over Midwestern states, in particular, including Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan, and cut across the country to reach the Carolinas by the weekend. That's according to FireSmoke Canada, a team of forecasters at the University of British Columbia. You can read more with a link in today's show notes. ♦ Faizan Zaki won the Scripps National Spelling Bee last night. The win comes after he lost last year in the spell off and became just the fifth runner-up to later win the bee. He sealed the deal by nailing the word, eclaircissement, running out of breath, and then collapsing to the floor as confetti fell on him and the crowd erupted. You can read more about the big win from our friends over at USA TODAY Sports. ♦ Thanks for listening to The Excerpt. We're produced by Shannon Rae Green and Kaely Monahan, and our executive producer is Laura Beatty. You can get the podcast wherever you get your audio, and if you're on a smart speaker, just ask for The Excerpt. As always, you can also email us at podcasts at I'm Taylor Wilson. I'll be back tomorrow with more of The Excerpt from USA TODAY.
Yahoo
41 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Gas prices 'among the cheapest in nearly a decade' to start summer, analyst says
Canada's gas price average fell by 5.4 cents per litre of regular fuel this week, according to data from Kalibrate. The break from recent gains mirrors price action in the United States, where a leading analyst says rates at the pump are "among the cheapest in nearly a decade" when adjusting for inflation. The Canadian average price fell from $1.492 per litre to $1.438 between May 22 and May 29, led by declines in Vancouver, Kelowna, B.C., and Sarnia, Ont. At this time last year, the national average price was $1.688. The U.S. Memorial Day holiday is considered the unofficial start to the summer driving season in North America. Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, says while prices did not fall as much as expected, the holiday was still one of the most affordable for drivers since 2021. "When adjusted for inflation, [it was] among the cheapest in nearly a decade,' he wrote in a blog post. 'As we move into the heart of summer, I believe we're likely to see a relatively stable stretch for gas prices as refinery maintenance wraps up." De Haan sees OPEC+ production commentary and growing uncertainty around the looming hurricane season in the U.S. Gulf region shaping prices in the weeks ahead. According to a report from Reuters, OPEC+ members may discuss a larger output increase in July compared to gains prior months at its meeting on Saturday. The potential additional supply could weigh on benchmark oil prices. Follow Yahoo Finance Canada for more weekly gas price updates. Scroll below to find your nearest city. (All figures in CAD cents) Location May. 22 May 29 Price Change Canada Average (V) 149.2 143.8 -5.4 WHITEHORSE 161.9 161.9 0 VANCOUVER* 183 167 -16 VICTORIA 176.2 181.5 5.3 PRINCE GEORGE 136.2 140.9 4.7 KAMLOOPS 150 152.9 2.9 KELOWNA 152.7 142.6 -10.1 FORT ST. JOHN 149.9 145.4 -4.5 ABBOTSFORD 172.4 160.8 -11.6 YELLOWKNIFE 144.7 134.9 -9.8 CALGARY* 137.2 131 -6.2 RED DEER 134.3 134.5 0.2 EDMONTON 134.9 130.7 -4.2 LETHBRIDGE 124.7 124.6 -0.1 LLOYDMINSTER 130.6 133.5 2.9 GRANDE PRAIRIE 131.1 137.9 6.8 REGINA* 134.9 134.8 -0.1 SASKATOON 135.6 135.6 0 PRINCE ALBERT 132.2 132.3 0.1 MOOSE JAW 135.7 135.7 0 WINNIPEG * 134.1 131.7 -2.4 BRANDON 127.6 131.7 4.1 CITY OF TORONTO* 139.4 135.4 -4 BRAMPTON 139.1 134.9 -4.2 ETOBICOKE 138.9 134.9 -4 MISSISSAUGA 138.8 134.1 -4.7 NORTH YORK 139.6 135.5 -4.1 SCARBOROUGH 139.4 135 -4.4 VAUGHAN/MARKHAM 139.3 135.1 -4.2 OTTAWA 138.9 133.2 -5.7 KINGSTON 132.6 128.8 -3.8 PETERBOROUGH 131.1 126.8 -4.3 WINDSOR 138.3 133.1 -5.2 LONDON 139.7 135.5 -4.2 SUDBURY 136.7 138.8 2.1 SAULT STE MARIE 128.3 128.3 0 THUNDER BAY 138.8 138.3 -0.5 NORTH BAY 131.4 136.8 5.4 TIMMINS 146.9 144.7 -2.2 HAMILTON 136.2 131.8 -4.4 ST. CATHARINES 135.9 129.8 -6.1 BARRIE 138.7 134.5 -4.2 BRANTFORD 132.8 128.4 -4.4 GUELPH 138.2 134.8 -3.4 KITCHENER 137.4 133.6 -3.8 OSHAWA 138.6 134.4 -4.2 SARNIA 134.8 124.4 -10.4 MONTRÉAL* 163.6 159.3 -4.3 QUÉBEC 156 155.3 -0.7 SHERBROOKE 152.8 152.3 -0.5 GASPÉ 157.6 157.4 -0.2 CHICOUTIMI 147 145.5 -1.5 RIMOUSKI 151.4 151.4 0 TROIS RIVIÈRES 154.6 151.8 -2.8 DRUMMONDVILLE 152.3 150.8 -1.5 VAL D'OR 159.6 159.6 0 GATINEAU 144.7 143.2 -1.5 SAINT JOHN* 143 144.2 1.2 FREDERICTON 144.7 145 0.3 MONCTON 143.8 144.4 0.6 BATHURST 143.5 142.3 -1.2 EDMUNDSTON 142.6 144 1.4 MIRAMICHI 144.9 146.2 1.3 CAMPBELLTON 143.1 146.3 3.2 SUSSEX 143.3 143.7 0.4 WOODSTOCK 144.8 146.2 1.4 HALIFAX* 145 145 0 SYDNEY 146.9 146.9 0 YARMOUTH 146 146 0 TRURO 146.1 146.1 0 KENTVILLE 145.5 145.5 0 NEW GLASGOW 146.1 146.1 0 CHARLOTTETOWN* 151.9 150.8 -1.1 ST JOHNS* 151.9 153.5 1.6 GANDER 155.7 157.3 1.6 LABRADOR CITY 159.1 160 0.9 CORNER BROOK 152.8 154.6 1.8 GRAND FALLS 155.7 157.3 1.6 SOURCE: KALIBRATE • All figures in CAD cents (*) Denotes markets used in Volume Weighted Canada Average Jeff Lagerquist is a senior reporter at Yahoo Finance Canada. Follow him on Twitter @jefflagerquist. Download the Yahoo Finance app, available for Apple and Android. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Business Insider
an hour ago
- Business Insider
Photos of the first supermarkets show how much grocery shopping has changed in a century
Before grocery stores, US families went to a variety of shops to buy food. Purchased food, as opposed to home-grown or homemade, was an increasing part of Americans' diet, especially for those who lived in cities during the late 1800s and early 1900s. Stocking up on groceries "was — and was understood to be — difficult, time-consuming, and important work," historian Tracey Deutsch wrote in " Building a Housewife's Paradise: Gender, Politics, and American Grocery Stores in the Twentieth Century." Shoppers, often women, would have to haggle over price. Availability could be inconsistent, so a seller might run out of a necessary ingredient, making meal planning difficult. Traipsing from one store to another could take up a substantial part of the day. Differences in race, ethnicity, and language among shoppers and sellers could add difficulty or friction to these tasks as well. Early grocery stores relied on clerks to give shoppers personal attention. In the 1920s, grocery stores were tiny hubs of local activity. They were typically around 500 square feet, the size of some present-day apartments. Most products were behind counters or in storerooms, and clerks would fetch the items and tell the customer the price. Shoppers had to trust that they were getting quality goods and a fair deal. These stores usually operated on credit. Customers could put purchases on their tab and settle their accounts when their wages came in. Shoppers might still need to buy produce and meat from separate shops or peddlers because grocery stores didn't offer them. Chain stores started growing in the 1910s and '20s. Unlike small, independent stores, chains could buy lots of goods at lower prices, passing savings on to customers. This was especially attractive during the inflationary period that followed World War I, when potatoes cost 147% more in 1923 than they had a decade earlier. Since smaller grocery stores often didn't list their prices, chain stores seemed to offer more transparency. Some contemporary estimates found chains selling branded items for roughly 9% and 11.5% less than independent retailers. Chain stores that started to gain success and recognition throughout this period included A&P and Kroger. Opening economy stores helped A&P achieve explosive growth. One of the first grocery chains in the US began as Gilman & Company in the 1850s and later became the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company, better known as A&P. After the Chicago Fire in 1871, the company expanded outside of New York. Five years later, it had 100 stores. By the 1930s, over 15,000 A&Ps were located throughout the country, making it the US' largest grocery store chain. One reason the company was able to expand so quickly was the introduction of its cash-and-carry economy stores in 1912. Instead of customers buying items on credit, they paid right away. Free delivery wasn't offered at these stores, and they all had the same products and layouts. Most of the products were canned or shelf-stable, like flour, but small iceboxes held perishables including butter and eggs. Economy A&Ps didn't have to keep track of customer accounts, track down late payments, or spend time traveling around the city dropping off groceries. They were more efficient to open and run, leading to substantial growth. "Although discounting was not a new idea, the economy store was an important building block on the way to the supermarket," historian Benjamin Davison wrote in a 2016 journal article. A large number of customers wanted low prices over perks like personal attention and free delivery. In the 1930s, some states started passing anti-chain bills over concerns they'd force mom-and-pop shops out of business. The more stores a company owned, the more they were taxed. A&P's growth model was suddenly a lot less attractive. Kroger helped usher in the era of one-stop shopping. In the 1920s, some independent retailers started embracing what was known as combination stores. They expanded into existing butcheries to sell meat to customers. Meanwhile, many chains relied on prepackaged food and couldn't sell fresh produce or meat. Kroger stores were an exception. Bernard H. Kroger started the Great Western Tea Company in 1883 in Cincinnati. As the chain expanded, so did its services. In 1901, some of its stores started baking their own bread. Three years later, the company purchased a meat packer to supply in-store meat departments. Cutting out suppliers helped Kroger have more control over pricing. He told the New York Times in 1901 that he could sell bread for 2 cents, half the price of everyone else in the city. "He buys coffee by the ship load and browns it himself," a man who had spoken with the grocery store founder told an Ohio newspaper the same year. By 1925, the Kroger Grocery & Baking Co., as it was then known, was making over $116 million (over $2 billion today) in sales, the Wall Street Journal reported in 1926. It operated 2,858 stores and several bakeries for bread, crackers, and cakes. Piggly Wiggly started a trend as the first self-service grocery store. Customers who entered a Piggly Wiggly went through a turnstile into an aisle lined with packaged foods. Unable to leave through the door they entered, they wound through the aisles, browsing goods with their prices prominently displayed. Employees might be restocking shelves, but they weren't there to sell shoppers on the latest detergent or entice them with a bargain on bacon. While that doesn't strike today's shopper as odd, to a reporter for the Boston Daily Globe in 1918, "the whole place is absolutely novel." Clarence Saunders had designed the first self-service Piggly Wiggly two years earlier in Memphis, Tennessee. Instead of having a clerk gather everyone's items, the shoppers could pick and choose the brand of soap or type of soup they wanted themselves. Flour, pickles, and other items were pre-weighed, so customers didn't have to guess the final price or wait for an employee to help measure the right amount. That also meant there was no meat counter with a butcher slicing ham or packing up pork chops. Piggly Wiggly was novel but not totally unique. California and Montana had self-service stores pre-dating Piggly Wiggly. However, Saunders gained attention for his opening-day stunts, like handing out roses to redheaded women, and for patenting some of his stores' designs, like the one-way layout that ended at the checkout station. The unique name, which one trade magazine described as having a "Mother Goosey sound," may have helped, too. Saunders seemed to purposefully shy away from explaining its origins. Franchising the name and design helped expand the store's reach quickly. By 1923, the US had over 1,200 Piggly Wigglys, most independently owned. That year, Saunders resigned after trying to raise the company's stock price by buying shares. Some historians have crowned King Kullen as the first true supermarket. In 1944, the Wall Street Journal reported that even industry experts couldn't settle on a definition for supermarkets. Most agreed the stores had several departments — including produce, meat, and dairy — and the grocery areas were self-service. The Super Market Institute put the minimum sales volume at $200,000 a year (about $3.6 million today). For some historians, all the pieces come together in Michael Cullen's King Kullen. In 1929, he was managing a Kroger in Illinois when he wrote to the company's president, William Albers, with an idea to create "monstrous" stores where goods would move quickly because they were priced with little markup. Thanks to the volume of items, they would still make a profit, he said. He predicted he'd sell $10,000 worth of groceries a week. By saving the public $1 to $3 on their food bills, he wrote, "I would be the 'miracle man' of the grocery business." Albers never saw the letter, and Cullen instead opened his own store in Queens, New York, in 1930. He took out ads calling King Kullen the "world's greatest price wrecker." The warehouse's 6,000 square feet held 1,000 items. Customers quickly started lining up. In 1936, Cullen died after complications from an appendectomy. His wife took over the company, which had opened more than a dozen stores, which together made more than $6 million a year (more than $139 million today). Three years after King Kullen announced itself as a price wrecker, Albers left Kroger to open his own eponymous stores, the first to use the term "super market" in its name. Ralphs is also a contender for the title. Like A&P and Kroger, Ralphs started in the 19th century. In 1873, brothers George and Walter Ralphs started selling local produce and grains in Los Angeles. The business grew, and in 1926, it had over 40 stores. Many catered to Los Angeles' commuters instead of relying on foot traffic. Car ownership in the US grew by over 4,000% between 1910 and 1930, especially in areas with little public transportation. When Ralphs opened its 10,000-square-foot self-service store in West Hollywood, it was the company's largest. It had a large parking lot for the shoppers' vehicles. Inside, the high-ceilinged, spacious store didn't seem like a typical grocery store. One columnist compared it to a "marketplace of Rome, where Phoenicians came to peddle their bright silks and bits of treasure from afar." "Some of these early Ralph buildings are almost as modern today as when they were built 25 and 30 years ago," supermarket analyst M. M. Zimmerman wrote in 1955. Taking advantage of its location, Ralphs prominently displayed its California produce. Its prices were higher than A&P's, but its business model proved popular enough that other LA-area grocers had created 30 similar stores by the time King Kullen opened in 1930. Big Bear was a bit like the Costco of its day. Many supermarket histories include New Jersey's Big Bear, which opened in 1932. Transforming a 50,000-square-foot auto plant into a cavernous, boisterous market, Robert Otis and Roy Dawson tipped their hats to King Kullen by calling their store a "price crusher." Only 15,000 square feet were devoted to grocery items, mostly in cans and packages. To get there, shoppers first had to pass by meat, produce, and bakery counters. A soda fountain, electronics, tools, cosmetics, drugs, and other departments made up the rest. Customers crowded around tables piled with merchandise. Some traveled 40 miles to take advantage of the store's low prices. It took Big Bear three days to rake in $31,000, one historian estimated. It might take a small chain store months to sell as much. People began referring to Big Bear and its many imitators as "barney stores." Some industry analysts dismissed the cheap fixtures and overwhelming layouts of these "wild animal" stores, which often had leopard, tiger, or other beasts in their names. Early supermarkets were large and operated by self-service. Other commonalities included free parking, a high volume of products, a certain amount of annual sales, and a variety of departments. By combining butcheries, bakeries, produce, and packaged goods under one roof, they offered one-stop food shopping. Sometimes these were independent contractors leasing space in a building with a big commercial footprint. These stores also differed from earlier grocers in other ways. Customers paid in cash, and the stores often didn't offer delivery services. The unofficial motto was "pile it high, and sell it cheap," one supermarket owner told Zimmerman in 1955. "What made supermarkets novel was not their low prices or self-service cash-and-carry approach, however, but the extraordinary array of goods and services they provided under one roof: fresh produce, dairy, meats, baked goods, and canned and packaged foods were to be had, but so were a stunning variety of other items and services," Shane Hamilton wrote in " Supermarket USA: Food and Power in the Cold War Farms Race." While some businesses, including Ralphs, incorporated attractive design into their layouts, others, like the barney stores, opted for affordability over aesthetics. Many early supermarkets were independent. It took large chains like A&P and Kroger longer to catch on to the new business model. Major grocery chains didn't open supermarkets right away. A few months after Big Bear opened in New Jersey, a grocery industry analyst told The New York Times it was a novelty that would wear off. "When that time comes, the verdict will be much the same as in Syracuse and Detroit, where ' warehouses' or supermarkets enjoyed a brief period of outstanding success and then experienced a decided drop in sales volume," he said. A&P's president, John Hartford, also said later that his company didn't take supermarkets seriously. Then it realized King Kullen was crushing its regional shops. By 1936, Safeway, A&P, and Kroger started opening bigger stores. Adapting to larger, high-volume stores proved successful for these chains. They closed smaller shops to focus on more lucrative supermarkets. The Depression, an increasing number of cars, and several other factors led to supermarkets' growth. Many customers were lured in by supermarkets' promise of low prices and a large selection. Shoppers with jobs also appreciated supermarkets' evening hours, as many chains closed at 6 p.m. Owners who had previously run smaller grocery stores saw their operating costs cut in half. Historians cite a variety of factors, from taxes on chain stores to improved refrigeration technology to regulations on food prices, to explain why the number of supermarkets exploded in the late 1930s and '40s. Mounds of products required new layouts and inventions. During this era, owners started figuring out how to better manage an influx of customers at busy times. They tried out new ways of displaying merchandise to attract buyers' attention. Placed at eye-level, the products would sell themselves. "Silent salesmanship prevailed in the subtlety of aisle displays that halted the progress of shoppers, at which point they might observe other shoppers and be influenced by their purchases," historian Lisa C. Tolbert wrote in " Beyond Piggly Wiggly: Inventing the American Self-Service Store." Navigating these spacious supermarkets packed with goods also prompted the spread of the shopping cart in the late 1930s. Owners wanted to attract wealthy customers. While some businesses had bargain prices that brought in a variety of shoppers, some chains that were closing stores in low-income neighborhoods opened their new supermarkets in wealthy areas, Deutsch wrote. They worried that cheap products weren't enough to bring in the middle-class women they wanted as customers. To distinguish themselves from barney stores, some supermarkets invested more in decor and offered perks like employees who carried groceries to shoppers' cars. "Upscale supermarkets were welcomed into postwar suburban housing developments in and around Chicago and quickly began emphasizing the quality and convenience of goods they sold, continuing to move away from an emphasis on price," Deutsch wrote in a 1999 journal article. Similarly, in Southern California, business owners strategically placed their supermarkets and mostly had all-white clientele. "In part, this was because a new supermarket had the potential to transform the demographics and economic life of an area, but it was also because operators carefully built stores adjacent to the most desirable clientele," Davison wrote. Supermarkets had a huge impact on how Americans ate. More types of prepackaged foods, the advent of frozen food, improved freezer technology, and other changes began impacting Americans' diets as supermarkets continued to grow. Farming methods were becoming more industrialized, and A&P and other sellers used new advances to their advantage to tap into a network of producers to find the most appealing potatoes, peaches, and peas from around the country. Customers in northern states got used to having certain fresh fruits and vegetables year-round instead of just seasonally. While they didn't have complete control of the supply chain, stores like A&P bought produce in large quantities, and "farmers who did not comply with the firm's demands for high-volume, standardized production were sure to be left outside the marketplace," Hamilton wrote. Supermarkets continued to expand in the 1950s. While some contemporary analysts had predicted that supermarkets would die out after the Depression ended, there were more stores than ever in the years following World War II. Many were stocking six times as many items as the earliest supermarkets. Most adopted the more sedate design of chains like A&P. "The older chaotic supermarkets were quickly replaced by the ordered, and overtly-feminized, space of the postwar super-market," Deutsch wrote. Many of these chains have since melded together or completely disappeared. Yet in just a few decades, they completely changed the way many Americans shopped for groceries, and we're still feeling those influences today. Sources: "Supermarket USA: Food and Power in the Cold War Farms Race" by Shane Hamilton; "Building a Housewife's Paradise: Gender, Politics, and American Grocery Stores in the Twentieth Century" by Tracey Deutsch; "Beyond Piggly Wiggly: Inventing the American Self-Service Store" by Lisa C. Tolbert; "Carried Away: The Invention of Modern Shopping" by Rachel Bowlby; "The American Grocery Store: The Business Evolution of an Architectural Space" by James M. Mayo; "The Super Market: A Revolution in Distribution" by M. M. Zimmerman; "From 'Wild Animal Stores' to Women's Sphere: Supermarkets and the Politics of Mass Consumption, 1930-1950" by Tracey Deutsch; "Super City: Los Angeles and the Birth of the Supermarket, 1914—1941" by Benjamin Davison; "The Rise of the Supermarket" by Tevere Macfadyen; International Directory of Company Histories; and Smithsonian Magazine.
