And for the most part it is shit. The food is too suspect to feed to my pets, and the consumer goods are notional facsimiles of real products. Like the Wow brand ShamWow, or the dish rag that won't make it through a wash cycle, or the Nerf gun knockoff that doesn't have any moving parts. None of this stuff is worth lifting off the shelf, let alone paying a dollar for.

I spent 6 hours of punching 1 dollar, 1 dollar, 1 dollar pondering over the people bringing this garbage to my counter, demanding indestructible plastic cups be wrapped in a dollars worth of tissue paper, repeatedly asking how much products cost as if they had not yet noticed they were in a dollar store. "How did this 70 year old woman decide today was the day she needed 20 slightly deformed acrylic cups? Has she been cupless all this time? And why return 2 hours later to get a dozen fake flowers?" I think I attributed that hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach to some concern that all these fools were being had, or perhaps that I was contributing to their hoarding illness.

The dread I felt was spot on, but the attribution was faulty. These people are not fools. The products they buy aren't fake but symbolic. They brought these offerings to my altar so that I might perform the "glassware" wrapping and price-check rituals of consumerism. I thought I was taking a job working a register, when I was really stepping behind the altar to become the liturgist of the Enfield congregation of the Dollar Tree denomination of Consumerism.

I have never been much of a devotee of the Consumer way of life, and the Dollar Tree denomination is the snake handling denomination of Consumerism. The products in a Walmart or Target could conceivably fill someone's need or desire. I doubt that much of what they sell is sold to fulfill practical wants and needs--their congregation of faithful parishioners who come to worship and trample every Black Friday for the year's must have electronic gadget attend regularly on a more distributed schedule throughout the year as well. But there is still a semblance of shame in the Walmart and Target version of idol worship. Your car floormats are a little dusty and the ones with the really rad flames on them just happen to be on sale! Outside the dollar store we're not quite ready to honestly confront what we believe in, who we are. At 16, with the quickly fading inoculation of an upbringing in the values of Presbyterianism, hard work, and education I was certainly not ready to deal with what I found in that Dollar Tree.

Most of the dollar stores do not accept coupons (Dollar Tree definitely does not)

Short version: on a casual challenge, I assembled a camping/survival ("bug out bag") kit from a dollar store with just $15.

Fun when a store has a broad range of stuff and one wonders "what can I do with pocket change here?"

First off there should never be an expired item in the store. If by chance you happen to come across an expired item, by making an employee or manager aware the item will be removed from the shelves immediately.

Secondly if you look closely at many of the products in the store you will find brand names to be different but the manufactures to be fairly well known. Americans tend to buy known brand names, thanks to advertising. Ask anyone who works in a packaging and labeling factory and they will tell you they label the same product with multiple different branding labels.

With that said my final point. Many company's have to much product, Dollar Tree corporate finds these companies and offers to buy all of their over head that would otherwise go spoiled or unsold at less than 48 cents on the unit. A prime example is Chicken of the Sea tuna which is owned by Van Camp's, however in Dollar Tree it is simply labeled Van Camp's (same great tuna just a different label and 20 cents cheaper).

Items will only be thrown in the dumpster if they're damaged or expired. Otherwise they're sent to another branch location for sale if it doesn't sell well.

Sure Dollar Tree deals with mass production companies located in china and other "cheap labor" parts of the world, so does the rest of the big boys in the S&P 500.

In my community Dollar Tree is the only company that hasn't frozen wages, still offers competitive wages, and offers decent employee benefits. I do not work for Dollar Tree nor am I affiliated with them in anyway, I currently work for the black hole A&P.

To me it screamed lots of overpriced cheap junk. Seriously, these stores are overpriced for the merchandise they sell.

Of course, not all dollar stores are created equal. There are some nice ones, but also "soul-less" ones that just sell complete, Toys-R-Us bargain bin junk that no one would enjoy...

http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2077.html

But for a typical salaried employee who's not motivated to start a business and who just wants something fun to do on the weekends, sure, it works great.

My wife coupons, and I don't remember the last time we paid over $.25 for a gallon of bleach, either...

The other danger: you see a coupon that excites a desire for a product you didn't previously think you wanted. Unless you have unusually tight control over yourself, you'll find your buying more stuff (http://paulgraham.com/stuff.html) you don't actually need.

Reading Kevin Kelly's quasi-blog Cool Tools: http://www.kk.org/cooltools/ also offers this danger, but it also very occasionally makes me find something I've always wanted and didn't realize, like the Best Book Stand Jasmine: http://jseliger.com/2010/09/04/highly-recommended-the-best-b... , which I use almost every day.