by Jessie Burchette
jburchette@salisburypost.com
ENOCHVILLE ó Dollar General opened its newest Rowan County store last week with no fanfare.
No problem.
Customers are already filling up the parking lot and the store.
“I’m glad they put it here,” Billy Upright said. “Boy I’m glad. I don’t have to go across town.”
Upright, who lives on nearby Tuckaseegee Road in Cabarrus County, stopped by on a recent morning to stock up on apple juice for his ailing 95-year-old father-in-law.
Upright is a also a fan of Dollar General. “Stuff has got so high, you can’t afford to go some places. Here, they got good prices.”
Others echoed Upright’s sentiment.
“I don’t have to go all the way to town,” Rosemary Crosby of Saw Road said. “I’m so glad they opened here.”
Enochville residents have waited for years to have a full-service store on the their side of Kannapolis.
For decades there was talk of a Food Lion shopping center on Enochville Avenue, but it never materialized.
Dollar General is now open in a new 7,300-square-foot building adjacent to CommunityOne Bank on Enochville Avenue.
Dollar General has more than 8,400 stores in 35 states with sales of $10.5 billion in sales in 2008.
The Goodlettsville, Tenn., chain has 72,000 employees.
The company’s niche is focused on providing neighborhood stores offering the most popular brands with a hassle-free shopping experience.
Jeff Thomas, manager of the new store, said the reactions has been very positive. “Everyone loves having it in the neighborhood. We’ve been very busy.”
Thomas has already filled all of the jobs, mostly from the temporaries hired to help stock the store and open.
Although all the jobs have been filled, Thomas said Dollar General continually accepts applications.
The Enochville store is the fifth Dollar General in and around Kannapolis.
Emily Weiss, a media relations manager for Dollar General, said the goal is to locate stores convenient to the customers. Typically, customers come from a three-mile radius.
In select sites, Weiss said, they look at several factors, including demographics, traffic patterns and customer needs.
Dollar General stores sell brand-name and private label products, including health and beauty aids, packaged food, housewares, cleaning supplies, greeting cards and seasonal products.
The stores also have some refrigerated foods and dairy products.