As Dollar General continues to improve the customer experience, shareholders have to wonder how high the ceiling is for sales and growth.
The Goodlettsville, Tennessee-based retailer performed well across every category during the fourth quarter, despite severe winter weather that affected stores at the start of the year.
“We have not only stabilized our core business, but we’ve laid the groundwork to drive meaningful growth over both the near and longer term,” CEO Todd Vasos said during the earnings call Thursday.
Net sales increased 5.9% to $10.9 billion, and same-store sales rose 4.3%. Customer traffic increased 2.6% compared with a year ago, and average transaction amounts rose 1.7%.
For the full fiscal year, net sales increased 5.2% year over year to $42.7 billion, and same-store sales grew 3%. Customer traffic rose 1.6%, and the average transaction amount increased 1.4%.
Dollar General projects net sales growth of 3.7% to 4.2% in 2026 and same-store sales growth of 2.2% to 2.7%.
Vasos spent a significant portion of the earnings call discussing progress on the company’s four strategic growth pillars: enhancing the customer experience, elevating the Dollar General brand, driving greater enterprise-wide efficiencies and extending reach.
“We believe we have a tremendous opportunity to gain additional market share with both new and existing customers as we look to drive trips both in-store and digitally,” Vasos said.
Dollar General will unveil a new store format in 2026 based on customer feedback. The format aims to create a more open and inviting layout that exposes customers to more categories as they navigate the store.
The company tested the new format during some DG remodel projects in 2025 and reported incremental sales lift and relative sales outperformance compared with traditional remodels.
DG has significantly expanded the reach of its delivery options and now offers delivery at about 18,000 stores through myDG Delivery and third-party partners DoorDash and Uber Eats. More than 80% of orders arrive in one hour or less.
“We estimate delivery sales contributed approximately 80 basis points to our comp sales growth of 4.3% in Q4,” Vasos said.
The DG Media Network focuses on accelerating on-site performance through expanded search capabilities, sponsored products and a stronger e-commerce experience. It also aims to expand DG’s ability to capture emerging off-site ad spending across social platforms, connected TV and video. In 2025, Dollar General generated about $170 million in retail media network volume.
Store remodels fall under either Project Renovate or Project Elevate. Project Renovate affects the entire store and includes adding or replacing coolers. The company primarily targets stores that are seven years removed from their last remodel. Project Elevate focuses on physical asset enhancements, merchandising updates, adjacency adjustments and category refreshes.
DG continues to target annualized comp sales lift of about 6% in Project Renovate stores and about 3% in Project Elevate stores. Customer surveys indicate both projects have improved customer sentiment, with each scoring more than 100 basis points higher after remodeling compared with the rest of the chain.
The retailer expects to complete 2,000 Project Renovate and more than 2,200 Project Elevate remodels this year.
In 2025, the company opened 581 stores in the United States and plans to open 450 in 2026. In addition, DG plans to open 10 more stores in Mexico.
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