Rural Counties Losing Share of Grocery Stores, Gaining Other Types of Food Retailers

December 20, 2021 Alexander Stevens, USDA ERS

Rural U.S. consumers may face challenges finding access to retail food stores, especially if they live in regions with high poverty rates and decreasing population. To address the retail food store access issue, Federal policymakers have passed legislation such as the 2010 Healthy Food Financing Initiative. It was created to attract grocery stores to certain areas and give existing retailers incentives to sell healthy products in underserved communities.

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“When you have a small rural town and the grocery store dies, the town dries up and it just blows away,” said Nancy McCloud, who revived B Street Market in 2017 and became its owner. “There are six towns east of here — they just lost the grocery store, then they lost the gas station, and then they lost the bank and now they’re nothing.”