SHAWNEETOWN, Ill. (WSIL) -- Eighty-two year old Arthur Heath stepped out of his pickup truck to meet a friend outside Shawnee Quik Mart, a convenience store and the only gas station in town.
Down the street is a storefront with the name 'Hattons' where Heath once worked as a meat cutter. The local chain once had a footprint in Gallatin County with locations in Equality, Omaha, Ridgway and Shawneetown.
Today those stores are all gone. There is no grocery store left in Gallatin County. The only place with any produce in Shawneetown is Dollar General.
"Thank goodness we have the dollar store," said Karen Dale, of Junction, Illinois. "They have a few things down there that you can get."
Store manager Annette Pierce does her shopping at the national chain that has more than doubled in size from roughly 8,300 stores in 2008 to more than 18,000 in 2021 according to annual company .
"[The] dollar store means a lot to me and my community," said Pierce. "We have to keep this store going. We need this store in town."
Most, if not all, of Gallatin County is a food desert. Those are areas where people have to drive more than a mile to get to a grocery store according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
As of 2020, more than 23.5 million Americans live in food deserts according to the USDA.
Residents of New Haven, one of the oldest towns in Illinois, have to drive at least 20 minutes to get to the nearest grocery store.
Julie Harper drives back and forth to Albion for work every day, a 45 minute trip. Harper's family only goes grocery shopping once every two weeks.
They can either drive 20 minutes to Carmi, Illinois or Mt. Vernon, Indiana or drive 45 minutes to Evansville, Indiana. Harper says Evansville has more items and cheaper gas. Harper spends roughly $240 a month on gas.
"It gets expensive after awhile traveling back and forth," said Harper.
Kevin Edmonds, the village president, said the town is trying to get a Dollar General in town but says New Haven still isn't on the chain's 'list'.
"I told them that this is an opportunity you can maybe even have a gas station too because there's over 6,000 cars that go by New Haven a day," said Edmonds. "[Ina has] a Dollar General and we can't get one?"
Heath says big chains like Walmart have made it harder for smaller stores to compete. Heath and his wife travel at least 15 or 20 minutes to Harrisburg once a week to shop at Walmart, Kroger or Aldi.
"That's just the way it is in our country," said Heath. "Everything's gone big."
