Grocery shopping is one of life’s shared necessities. Some people love it, others find it to be a chore. Personally, I find the weekly ritual to be both soothing and fun. This probably says something about my middle-aged suburban life right now, but that’s a story for another post.
Since there’s a need for food and personal care items, these products are readily available in any suburban environment. These stores that carry a little bit of everything to make our lives a little more convenient are known as general stores.
General stores have been around long before the invention of the supermarkets and malls. In the 1800s, these stores served as a social hub in small towns. The oldest general store dates back to 1781, and much of this unique heritage has stayed the same since the 19th century. If you’re thinking about starting an updated version of the general store, we rounded up these business name suggestions to help you get started.
- General Store Name Ideas
- Other Names For A General Store
- Corner Store Name Ideas
- Discount Store Name Ideas
- What Items Do General Stores Typically Sell?
General Store Name Ideas
Shopping at general stores is about the convenience and location.
For over 200 years, general stores have been the hub of small communities and are as much a part of American heritage as Cowboys and Indians or Budweiser. Originally, these stores were known as general stores because they sold everything you needed, from dried meats and flour to “grits” and gunpowder.
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Names often included the owner’s name in the title, such as the Shaw’s General Store and the Brown & Hopkins Country Store. Others were named for the town they were in like the Jefferson General Store and the Williamsburg General Store.
You can use your own name, the street or town you are in, any kind of local landmark, or even name it after your kids. There are dozens of approaches you could use to come up with an identifiable brand. Here are some of our best ideas from a late-night brainstorming session with the staff:
- AAA Grocery
- Aeron General Store
- All Natural Grocer
- Annie’s Blue Ribbon General Store
- Arbor General Store
- Archie’s Food Basket
- Better Land Grocery
- Blackcreek General Store
- Brookshire Brothers
- Brown Wave Grocery
- Bruno’s Groceries
- Cellyssa General Store
- Charlie’s Retail
- Cole Grocery and Deli
- Cornucopia
- Daily Buy General Store
- Daily Select Grocery
- Essential Groceries
- Fresh Hills Grocery
- General Groceries
- Heritage General Store
- Jackson Street Grocery
- Joy General Store
- Nature Fresh Grocery
- North St. General Store
- Pavilion General Store
- Rosales General Store
- Shields General Store
- SpringMart Grocery
- Spruce City Grocery
- Super Fresh Grocery
- The Full Cart
- Van’s General Store
- Whole Mart Grocery
- Woodstock General
Other Names For A General Store
General stores are often family-run businesses.
Having the words general store in the name is not a requirement. There are many other options like grocery, store, mercantile, market, mart, goods, warehouse, and depot that could also work.
Changing the name in this way does not mean the store is any different from what a general store normally is. It’s just a different way of describing the same type of store over the years.
This can actually make it a little more memorable for customers since there are possibly a lot of Brown’s General Stores across the country. So try out any of these takes on our updated general store name suggestions.
- Authentic Shoppe
- Best Price Grocery
- BestMart
- Blue Markert
- Brookland Market
- City Market
- Exception Market
- Food Town
- Freshway
- Golden Meadow
- Grapevines
- Greater Goods
- Grocery Warehouse
- Harvest Moon Grocery
- Little Big Mart
- Lone Star Grocery
- Lucky’s Mart
- Magic Mart
- Mr. Shop
- Not Just Groceries
- One Stop Shop
- Pier 33
- Premier Mart
- Serious Shoppers
- Shopper’s Shelter
- Spring Mart Grocery
- Stable Groceries
- Sundown Groceries
- The Food Depot
- The Food Masters
- The Fresh Wagon
- The Gourmet Garage
- The Mega Store
- Unique Groceries
- Urban Grocery
Corner Store Name Ideas
Perfectly located on the corner for better visibility for customers.
Corner shops can be found on city street corners across the country. Corner property has always been considered prime real estate for stores due to the increased visibility of being seen by multiple streets.These shops could be positioned on the corner of an intersection or junctions. Here are some of our most captivating corner store name ideas.
- Corner Mini Market
- Cornermall
- Corners and Stuff
- Cornerstone Shop
- Dawn Till Dusk
- Deluxe Mall
- Eldorado
- Elle’s Corner
- E-Z Go Corner Store
- Family Market
- Island Shop
- Liberty Land
- Main Junction Store
- Neptune’S Corner
- On the Corner
- One Stop Corner Shop
- Open All Hours
- Orion Cornershop
- Shopnest
- Spicer’s Corner
- The Corner Deli
- The Corner Mart
- The Corner Store
- The Cornershop
- The Intersection
- The Little Big Store
- The Worldly Grocer
- Three Corners Store
- Union Grocery
- Upscale Market
- Intersection Grocery
- Four Corners Store
- Yellow Light Market
Discount Store Name Ideas
Discount stores are a good way to save money on everyday essentials.
Discount stores snap up unsold merchandise from other retailers and sell them at deep discounts to customers. Often these stores will carry inventory that didn’t catch on in retail and have been sold for almost nothing to recoup some of the expense. The popular dollar store is an example of this type of discount outlet.
From a business perspective these are retail stores can be operated profitably even during recessionary times because the inventory is low cost. When people are struggling to make ends meet these are the stores they turn to for groceries and other necessities. Cost is the main appealing factor in discount stores. Check out our name ideas below, which is 100% off just for you!
- Cheap Street
- Cheap’s Cheapest
- Delia’s Discount Store
- Discount Grocery
- Dollar Savings Store
- Dollarmart
- Donna’s Discounts
- Food 4 Less
- Foodland Discount
- Low Price Deals
- Minute Buy
- More for Less
- Payless
- Save Mart
- Save-A-Lot
- Save-On-Foods
- Shoes Discount
- Sid’s Savers
- Steps To Saving
- Super Saver Grocery
- Super Value Store
- The Cheap Shop
- Top Discount
- Top Price
- Treasure Island
What Items Do General Stores Typically Sell?
General stores sell a little bit of everything.
While they may look small, general stores are actually deceptively large. In fact, they are designed to cram more stuff into a smaller area to tempt you to buy more than you thought you needed when you walked through the door.
On average, general stores and grocery stores carry over 39,500 line items at any one time. And with so many choices crammed into a small space, you are certain to be tempted by those cartons of pineapple smoothies or the freezers full of ice cream flavors.
Overall, general stores do “exactly what it says on the tin”, to coin a popular phrase from the 90’s. An amazingly accurate description of the contents of the shop, general stores sell pretty much everything.
Originally the only store in town where you can buy your nails and dry foods and flour and gunpowder, the general stores of today sell all the normal grocery items you might expect to find in the supermarket in addition to clothing and personal care items. Dried foods, rice, flour, gravy mix, dried fruits and stuff for baking, canned goods like sardines, peaches, SPAM, and anything else you might find resting in the kitchen pantry.
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But it’s not just grocery goods. You can also find plenty of frozen foods in the small chest or wall freezers that the stores have, from ice cream and frozen peas to bags of ice and ready-cook meals for one.
Then you have the chiller cabinets, with the chilled foods and packet meals, bottled water, beer, spirits, and sodas. Behind the counter, you can often find cigarettes, alcohol, or more expensive items like perfumes.
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Visit any modern grocery store and you can also find all you stationery needs, from staples and paper to pencils and ink. Toys can sometimes be found inside too, as well as things like paper plates, plastic sporks, glue, a new mug for dad, flowers for the wife (occasionally), and even hardware items or electrical supplies. The inventory is only limited by your creativity.
Being able to get what you need in just a few minutes without too much hassle at any time of the day (or night, in some cases) continues to be an appeal for this type of retail store. It’s amazing to see these businesses still going strong after 200+ years.
