Small grocers feel squeezed by suppliers, and shoppers bear the pain

Independent grocery stories, often lifelines in small, rural communities, try to scrape by on smaller margins while bigger rivals get better deals from wholesalers.


Independent grocers like Buche Foods are facing unprecedented challenges in the face of competition, industry consolidation and thinning margins. Here, shoppers scan the offerings at Buche Foods, the only supermarket on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, in May. (Eunice Straight Head/For The Washington Post)

By Jaclyn Peiser
August 25, 2024 at 8:05 a.m. ED

PINE RIDGE, S.D. — RF Buche, whose family has been running grocery stores in South Dakota since 1905, hears the complaints and can hardly disagree: Yes, prices are too high. But no, he insists, he isn’t ripping anyone off.

But many of his customers have a tough time reconciling how the head of Buche Foods — the only full-service supermarket on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, a stretch of plains larger than the state of Delaware — might not have the final say on store prices.

Buche says he understands the frustration but has little room to maneuver. Like other retailers, he’s had to contend with inflation, supply chain disruptions, consolidation and other fallouts of the pandemic. But as an independent grocer, his seven-store chain doesn’t have the purchasing power of a Walmart, Costco or Kroger to leverage wholesalers on price or priority. That’s why his shoppers can see a price differential of 20 percent to 100 percent on everything from potatoes to diapers.

“We have to defend ourselves against accusations of price-gouging and that really, really stings,” said Buche (pronounced BOO-ey), scanning the produce aisle as most shopping carts trundled by with one or more loaves of sliced white bread on sale that week, marked down {50} percent.

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Two Pine Ridge residents participate in a relay on the reservation, home to 32,000 members of the Oglala Sioux Tribe. Residents here don’t have easy access to national retail chains; the closest Walmart is 55 miles away. (Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post)

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By Jaclyn Peiser
Jaclyn Peiser covers retail for The Washington Post. She previously worked overnight on The Post's Morning Mix team and covered the media industry for the New York Times. Twitter