What Do You Buy at Dollar Tree?

antmary said:
.....................I don't buy anything to eat either.
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I rarely buy food there either, but some of their food is name brands, but in smaller containers. Seems to be an evolving niche market.
 
My favorite purchase and bargain are their gift bags (Christmas, Birthdays etc) I also have occasionally found some nice coffee mugs and bowels in there. Also, they carry a fairly good size bottle of Ocean Spray Red Ruby grapefruit juice there, but sell out everyday by mid afternoon.

Sometimes notepads if they are big enough. Eye glass neck straps when I can find them. Best pair I have purchased, I got for a $1.00, but have not been able to find anymore.
 
toothpaste
palmolive bath soap--3 bars for a dollar--my main source of soap for years
aluminum foil
some food items--mushrooms in a jar, some canned fish

There is another store owned by Dollar Tree called Dollar Deals or Dollar Tree Deals which has very low prices on the same type of merchandise, but there is no one dollar limit on the prices. Lots of good values to be found. They are not that common as there may only be one or two in a big city.
 
Glow sticks
Hangers
Gift bags
Bags of small river rocks for terrariums
 
Wow, I never knew they had all that stuff. I'll have to take a second look. Dollar General is more prevalent around here but I've never bought more than reading glasses there. The inventories sound similar though.

Since I'll soon be rejoining the ranks of the unemployed, and other sites have a lot of info on photographic creativity with "junk" I'll take a closer look next time I'm near one.
 
Although I like Dollar Tree, I love the .99c store in my neighborhood......they carry lots of fresh food/vegetables/lettuce not available at my Dollar Tree. Anybody else go there?
 
Walt34 said:
Wow, I never knew they had all that stuff. I'll have to take a second look. Dollar General is more prevalent around here but I've never bought more than reading glasses there. .
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DG has good buys, best is to buy online. Free shipping over $25, and they usuallly have a $5 off coupon for $25 orders.
 
Trail mix - you can buy the bags of various ingredients and mix them yourself - good stuff.
Hotdog buns and liters of soda for kid parties
duct tape and cheap tools to have in auto/atv

I havent been in a DT store for several months.....now I'm going to next time out :rolleyes:

We had a wisebuy closeby - everything less than 10 bucks - there were some great deals there - went out of business.

How long can these 1 dollar stores stay open? The bags will get smaller and smaller... m&ms will have 9 per bag ;)
 
ERD50 said:
Alkaline batteries. A 4-pack of AA or AAA for...$1!

I used to buy the 48 pack at costco, but even at that count they were ~ $0.48 each, almost double the $0.25 at DT.


Make sure you get the Alkaline type (currently Sunbeam labeling), NOT 'super-heavy-duty', which are old, old tech and not a good value at all compared to alkaline.


-ERD50
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Do you have any history w/ these? I used to buy some brand at the local hardware store. They seemed to be ok but after some shelf life some of them were dead while others were ok...........no quality control built in.
Forgot the name.....but batteries were gold/black color .
 
jerome len said:
Although I like Dollar Tree, I love the .99c store in my neighborhood......they carry lots of fresh food/vegetables/lettuce not available at my Dollar Tree. Anybody else go there?
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I checked their website and I believe that their stores are only in the West, particularly CA. There are quite a few dollar stores in this area, including Family Dollar and Dollar General, but Dollar Tree is the only one where the price of everything is only one dollar.

I never shopped at dollar stores until recently; the great recession made me a loyal customer and this forum has sure helped change my mindset.
 
RE: AA & AAA alkaline batteries...

kaneohe said:
Do you have any history w/ these? I used to buy some brand at the local hardware store. They seemed to be ok but after some shelf life some of them were dead while others were ok...........no quality control built in.
Forgot the name.....but batteries were gold/black color .
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I've only been buying them for 6 months, so no real personal data. Reviews were positive. The packages are dated ('Best Before' 2018 & 2019 on the ones I just bought).

Just make sure you are getting ALKALINES, not 'super heavy duty' or 'heavy duty'. Alkalines a far superior to those old types.

These things are a commodity. I know people who say they have been in the factories and have seen the same unmarked batteries from the production line get shuttled over for various brand markings. I recall a Consumer Reports test that pretty much validated this. IIRC, more variation batch-to-batch than from brand-to-brand. It's possible that QC could be lax on lower cost ones, but I'm not aware that it is a significant issue.

OTOH, I avoid buying cheap coin cells on Amazon or other on-line places. The cheap ones appear to be repackaged, with old dates and/or may have been in a hot warehouse (ages lithium batteries).

OK, now you got me curious, so I 'm going to run my battery tester on each my stock (wha'dya do all day?). This tester puts it under load, and measures current (indicating voltage under load), back in a minute......

OK, so I had three 4-packs, and one pack with 3 left in it. All measured 4.2-4.3 on my meter, no significant variation, and typical of what I've seen on other new batteries. A reading of 4.0 is considered 'good' on this scale, but I've put used ones into service when they've read 3.5, and I can still get plenty of life out of them. I really doubt these are of any lesser quality that anything else you can buy on the regular market.

-ERD50
 
when in AZ for the winter, I get all frozen or cold foods at Albertson's in Blythe, but almost all dry goods at the Dollar Store or Family Dollar in town. <ironic due to the ~30 min drive w/frozen foods>
 
REWahoo said:
I never shop for bowels - even at Dollar Tree.

Go ahead, call me gutless...:D
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The dollar tree near me carries tripe and chitlins. Although I never buy these particular delicacies. So you could shop for bowels at dollar tree.

I forgot to mention another thing I have bought at dollar tree. Wheat bread. Nature's own brand I think. The kind usually $3 or so at the grocery store. Keeps the bowels regular.
 
ERD50 said:
RE: AA & AAA alkaline batteries...
Just make sure you are getting ALKALINES, not 'super heavy duty' or 'heavy duty'. Alkalines a far superior to those old types.
-ERD50
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I have not bought a non-reachargeable AA or AAA battery in years.
All my stuff runs on Sanyo Eneloop (a rechargeable battery, which keeps charge for a long time, more than 5 years with their 3rd generation).
At about ~ $2.50 per battery they are ten times more expensive than DT alkaline, but I've definitely got my money worth back and probably lowered my environmental footprint.
 
sailor said:
I have not bought a non-reachargeable AA or AAA battery in years.
All my stuff runs on Sanyo Eneloop (a rechargeable battery, which keeps charge for a long time, more than 5 years with their 3rd generation).
At about ~ $2.50 per battery they are ten times more expensive than DT alkaline, but I've definitely got my money worth back and probably lowered my environmental footprint.
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I've looked into these Eneloop rechargeables several times, they don't make economic sense for me. I don't have many things that 'gobble' AA or AAA's - mostly remotes, clocks, and other things that go a year or more before needing replacement. So a 10 year payback at least, and that doesn't include the cost of the charger (and opportunity cost). Some of my older chargers for ni-cads died before 10 years - one incident like that could wipe out my payback for a long time.

I try to avoid anything that would gobble AA/AAA, those are probably better served with rechargeable lithium cells, or NIMH (cordless phones).

I dated that 48-pack from Costco that I bought earlier. I forget the exact numbers now, but it lasted several years, and that is spread out across many remotes, clocks, weather station remotes, etc. I'd be looking at $100 outlay to replace most of them, the $4 opportunity cost alone would buy 16 batteries a year.

I don't think alkaline batteries have much of an environmental impact (and you have to add the charger to the equation), but it would be nice if these super low power devices had some sort of way to power themselves to avoid trashing even those little things. I've seen plans for things that pick up sounds/vibration, solar of course, or movement (picking up the remote would generate a little current), or radio waves in the air. Clocks and remotes and things use so little average power, it seems possible.

-ERD50
 
I was in the Dollar Tree about a year ago looking for something and I found chicken broth, 32 oz box for $1. Bought a dozen. They also carry beef broth. That's a good buy. A 13 oz can in a regular store is $.85. I also bought some Dutch Mill brand cookies for $1. Same box of cookies in Publix is $2.79. Needed some mitts for grilling so I picked up a couple of those also. Another thing I have purchased there is bleach. Never go there on a regular basis but these are the type of things I might buy now that I know what they carry.
 
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ERD50 said:
I've looked into these Eneloop rechargeables several times, they don't make economic sense for me. I don't have many things that 'gobble' AA or AAA's - mostly remotes, clocks, and other things that go a year or more before needing replacement. So a 10 year payback at least, and that doesn't include the cost of the charger (and opportunity cost). Some of my older chargers for ni-cads died before 10 years - one incident like that could wipe out my payback for a long time.
I try to avoid anything that would gobble AA/AAA, those are probably better served with rechargeable lithium cells, or NIMH (cordless phones).
-ERD50
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I understand your economic payback, for me it definitely makes sense, because nowadays most of my AA/AAA and C/D (I use sleeves and put AAs there too) usage comes from kids toys and believe me - some of them have been re-charged daily.
At least even my youngest (4 y.o.) can exchange the batteries in most of the toys and even put the empty ones in the charger :)
 
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