Dollar General (DG) Risk Factors

The retail business is highly competitive with respect to price, customers, store location, merchandise quality, product assortment and presentation, service offerings, product sourcing and supply chain capacity, in-stock consistency, customer service, ease of shopping experience (including but not limited to various modes of shopping, including online alternatives), promotional activity, employees, and market share. We compete with discount stores and many other retailers, including mass merchandise, warehouse club, grocery, drug, convenience, variety, online retailers, and certain specialty stores. To maintain our competitive position, we may be required to lower prices, either temporarily or permanently, and may have limited ability to increase prices in response to increased costs, resulting in lower margins and reduced profitability. Certain of our competitors have greater financial, distribution, marketing and other resources, and may be able to secure better arrangements with suppliers, than we. Competition is intense, and is expected to continue to be so, with certain competitors reducing their store locations while others enter or increase their presence in our geographic and product markets (including through the expansion of availability of delivery services) and expand availability of mobile, web-based and other digital technologies to facilitate a more convenient and competitive online and in-store shopping experience. We currently do not offer online shopping to a significant degree and have seen a greater willingness of our customers to adopt online shopping. In addition, if our competitors or others were to enter our industry in a significant way, including through alliances or other business combinations, it could significantly alter the competitive dynamics of the retail marketplace and result in competitors with greatly improved competitive positions, which could materially affect our financial performance. Our ability to effectively compete will depend substantially upon our continued ability to develop and execute compelling and cost-effective strategies and initiatives. If we fail to anticipate or respond effectively to competitive pressures, industry changes and customer preferences and shopping habits, it could materially affect our results of operations and financial condition.

Primarily because of sales of Christmas-related merchandise, our most profitable sales mix generally occurs in the fourth quarter. In anticipation of this holiday, we purchase substantial amounts of seasonal inventory, and if sales fall below seasonal norms or our expectations, it could result in unanticipated markdowns. Adverse events, such as deteriorating or challenging economic conditions, high unemployment rates, high gas or energy prices, transportation disruptions, or unusual or unanticipated adverse weather could result in lower-than-planned sales during the Christmas selling season, which in turn could reduce our profitability and otherwise adversely affect our financial performance and operating results.

We rely on our distribution and transportation network to provide goods to our stores timely and cost-effectively. Using various transportation modes, including ocean, rail, and truck, we and our vendors move goods from vendor locations to our distribution centers and our stores, and we also lease additional temporary warehouse space as necessary to support our distribution needs. Any disruption, unanticipated or unusual expense or operational failure related to this process (including, without limitation, inventory receipt and delivery delays; increases in fuel costs; increases in transportation costs, including increased import freight costs, carrier or driver wages (as a result of driver shortages or otherwise); earlier than expected receipt of seasonal inventory leading to capacity constraints which can be exacerbated by unexpected delays in acquiring additional temporary warehouse space sufficient for our inventory needs; a decrease in transportation capacity for overseas shipments or port closures; labor shortages; or work stoppages or slowdowns) could negatively impact sales and profits. Labor shortages or work stoppages or slowdowns in the transportation industry or disruptions to the national and international transportation infrastructure that necessitate our securing alternative labor or shipping suppliers could also increase our costs or otherwise negatively affect our business. We maintain a network of distribution facilities and are moving forward with plans to build or lease new facilities (including temperature-controlled distribution centers) to support our growth objectives and strategic initiatives. Delays in opening such facilities could adversely affect our financial performance by slowing store growth or the rollout/development of certain strategic initiatives, which may in turn reduce revenue growth and/or profitability, or by increasing transportation and product costs. In addition, distribution-related construction or expansion projects entail risks that could cause delays and cost overruns, such as: availability of temperature-controlled distribution centers and refrigerated transportation equipment; shortages of materials or skilled labor; work stoppages; unforeseen construction, scheduling, engineering, environmental or geological problems; weather interference; fires or other casualty losses; and unanticipated cost increases. For these reasons, the completion date and ultimate cost of these projects could differ significantly from initial expectations, and we cannot guarantee that any project will be completed on time or within established budgets.

Many of our customers have fixed or low incomes and limited discretionary spending dollars. Any factor that could adversely affect their disposable income could decrease our customers' spending or cause them to shift their spending to our lower margin product choices, which could result in materially decreased sales and/or profitability. Factors that could reduce, and in many cases have reduced, our customers' disposable income include but are not limited to high unemployment or underemployment levels or decline in real wages; inflation; pandemics (such as the COVID-19 pandemic); higher fuel, energy, healthcare, housing and product costs; higher interest rates, consumer debt levels, and tax rates; lack of available credit; tax law changes that negatively affect credits and refunds; and decreases in, or elimination of, government assistance programs or subsidies such as unemployment and food/nutrition assistance programs, student loan repayment forgiveness and economic stimulus payments. Many of the economic factors listed above, as well as commodity rates; transportation, lease and insurance costs; wage rates (including the heightened possibility of increased federal and further increased state and/or local minimum wage rates); foreign exchange rate fluctuations; measures that create barriers to or increase the costs of international trade (including increased import duties or tariffs); changes in applicable laws and regulations (including tax laws related to the corporate tax rate); and other economic factors, also could impair our ability to successfully execute our strategies and initiatives, as well as increase our cost of goods sold and selling, general and administrative expenses (including real estate costs), and may have other adverse consequences that we are unable to fully anticipate or control, all of which may materially decrease our sales or profitability. Inflation in the United States rose significantly in 2022, primarily believed to be the result of the economic impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic, and although it moderated in 2023, it remains elevated in certain areas, including food. If food (and in particular, "food at home") inflation continues to increase, we may not be able to adjust prices sufficiently to offset the effect without negatively impacting customer demand or our gross margin. Additionally, to the extent that these inflationary pressures result in a recessionary environment, we may experience material adverse effects on our business, results of operations and cash flows. For more information, see the "Executive Overview" section of Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations, included in Part II, Item 7 of this report.

The occurrence of one or more natural disasters, such as hurricanes, fires, floods, tornadoes and earthquakes, unusual or extreme weather conditions, pandemic outbreaks or other health crises (for example, the COVID-19 pandemic), political or civil unrest, acts of war, violence or terrorism (including within our stores, distribution centers or other Company property), or disruptive global political events (for example, the political tensions involving China, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and the conflict in the Middle East) or similar disruptions could adversely affect our business, financial performance and reputation. If any of these events result in the closure, or a limitation on operating hours, of one or more of our distribution centers, a significant number of stores, our sourcing offices, our corporate headquarters or data center or impact one or more of our key suppliers, our operations and financial performance could be materially and adversely affected through an inability or reduced ability to make deliveries, process payroll or provide other support functions to our stores and through lost sales. These events also could affect consumer shopping patterns or prevent customers from reaching our stores, which could lead to lost sales and higher markdowns, or result in increases in fuel or other energy prices, fuel shortage(s), new store or distribution center opening delays, the temporary lack of an adequate work force in a market, the temporary or long-term disruption of product availability in our stores, the temporary or long-term inability to obtain or access technology needed to effectively run our business, disruption of our utility services or information systems, and damage to our reputation. These events may also increase the costs of insurance if they result in significant loss of property or other insurable damage or loss by us or in the market more generally. Furthermore, the long-term impacts of global climate change present the possibility of both physical risks (such as extreme weather conditions or rising sea levels) and transition risks (such as regulatory or technology changes), which may be widespread and unpredictable. Over time, these changes, as well as regulatory efforts related thereto, could affect, for example, the availability and cost of products, commodities and energy (including utilities), which in turn may impact our ability to procure goods and services required for the operation of our businesses at the quantities and levels and at the costs we require. In addition, our operations and facilities may be located in areas impacted by the physical risks of climate change, and we face the risk of losses incurred as a result of physical damage to stores, distribution centers, or our corporate offices, as well as loss or spoilage of inventory and business interruption caused by such events. We also use natural gas, diesel fuel, gasoline and electricity in our operations, all of which could face increased regulation relating to climate change or other environmental concerns. Regulations limiting greenhouse gas emissions and energy inputs may also increase in coming years, which may increase our costs associated with compliance and merchandise purchases. These events and their impacts could otherwise disrupt and adversely affect our operations and could materially adversely affect our financial performance.

We rely on the positive cash flow we generate from our operating activities and our access to the credit and capital markets to fund our operations, growth strategy, and return of cash to our shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. Changes in the credit and capital markets, including market disruptions, limited liquidity and interest rate increases, may increase the cost of financing or restrict our access to these potential sources of future liquidity. There continues to be market uncertainty, which could result in further increases in our cost of borrowing. Our continued access to liquidity sources on favorable terms depends on multiple factors, including our operating performance and credit ratings. Standard & Poor's recently changed our outlook from stable to negative. Further, our current increased debt leverage levels have reduced our excess capital capacity with respect to capital allocation, and these levels, combined with our desire to maintain our current investment grade credit rating, could reduce our flexibility in planning for or reacting to changes in our industry and market conditions, increase our vulnerability in the event of a downturn in our business operations, and/or negatively impact our ability to pursue certain operational and strategic opportunities. Our debt securities currently are rated investment grade, and a downgrade of this rating likely would negatively impact our access to the debt capital markets and increase our cost of borrowing. As a result, disruptions in the debt markets or any downgrade of our credit ratings could adversely affect our business operations and financial condition and our ability to return cash to our shareholders. We can make no assurances that our ability to obtain additional financing through the debt markets will not be adversely affected by economic conditions or that we will be able to maintain or improve our current credit ratings.

In connection with sales, we transmit confidential credit and debit card information which is encrypted using point-to-point encryption. We also have access to, collect or maintain certain private or confidential information regarding our customers, employees and their dependents, vendors and business. Some of this information is stored electronically in connection with our e-commerce and mobile applications, some of which may leverage third-party service providers. Additionally, we may share information with and depend upon select vendors to assist us in conducting our business. While we have implemented procedures and technology intended to protect such information and require appropriate controls of our vendors, external attackers could compromise such controls and result in unauthorized disclosure of such information, as attacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated, may include attacks on our third-party business partners, and do not always or immediately produce detectable indicators of compromise. Moreover, inadvertent or malicious internal personnel actions could result in a defeat of security measures and a compromise of our or our third-party vendors' information systems. Furthermore, if a vendor is the victim of a cyberattack, including a ransomware attack, such attack could have a corresponding material effect on our ability to do business with that vendor or to receive information that may be required to timely prepare our financial statements. Due to the political tensions involving China, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and the conflict in the Middle East, there is an increased likelihood that escalation of tensions could result in cyberattacks that could directly or indirectly impact our operations. Like other retailers, we and our vendors have experienced threats to, and incidents involving, data and systems, including by perpetrators of attempted random or targeted malicious attacks; computer malware, ransomware, bots, or other destructive or disruptive hardware and/or software; and attempts to misappropriate our and our customers' information and cause system failures and disruptions, although to date none have been material to our business. If attackers obtain customer, employee or vendor passwords through unrelated third-party breaches, and if impacted customers, employees, or vendors do not employ good online security practices (e.g., use the same password across different sites or do not use available multifactor authentication options), these passwords could be used to gain access to their information or accounts with us in certain situations. Because we accept debit and credit cards for payment, we are subject to industry data protection standards and protocols, such as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards, issued by the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council. Nonetheless, we or our applicable payment processing partner(s), may be vulnerable to, and unable to detect and appropriately respond to, cardholder data security breaches and data loss, including successful attacks on applications, systems, or networks. A significant security breach of any kind experienced by us or one of our vendors, which could be undetected for a period of time, or a significant failure by us or one of our vendors to comply with applicable privacy and information security laws, regulations and standards could expose us to risks of data loss, litigation, government enforcement actions, fines or penalties, credit card brand assessments, negative publicity and reputational harm, business disruption and costly response measures (e.g., providing notification to, and credit monitoring services for, affected individuals, as well as further upgrades to our security measures; procuring a replacement vendor if one of our current vendors is unable to fulfill its obligations to us due to a cyberattack or incident) which may not be covered by or may exceed the coverage limits of our insurance policies, and could materially disrupt our operations. Any resulting negative publicity could significantly harm our reputation which could cause us to lose market share because of customers discontinuing the use of our e-commerce and mobile applications or debit or credit cards in our stores or not shopping in our stores altogether and could materially and adversely affect our business and financial performance.

We depend on a variety of information technology systems, including systems owned and managed by third-party vendors, for the efficient functioning of our business, including, without limitation, transaction processing and the management of our employees, facilities, logistics, inventories, stores and customer-facing digital applications and operations. Such systems are subject to damage or interruption from power surges and outages, facility damage, physical theft, computer and telecommunications failures, inadequate or ineffective redundancy, malicious code (including malware, ransomware, or similar), successful attacks (e.g., account compromise; phishing; denial of service; and application, network or system vulnerability exploitation), software upgrade failures or code defects, natural disasters and human error. Due to the political tensions involving China, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and the conflict in the Middle East, there is an increased likelihood that escalation of tensions could result in cyberattacks that could either directly or indirectly impact our operations. Design defects, damage to, or interruption to these systems may require a significant investment to repair or replace, disrupt our operations and affect our ability to meet business and reporting requirements, result in the loss or corruption of critical data, and harm our reputation, all of which could materially and adversely affect our business or results of operations. Our technology initiatives may not deliver desired results or may do so on a delayed schedule. We rely heavily on our information technology staff to fulfill our technology initiatives while continuing to provide maintenance on existing systems, as well as on third parties to maintain and periodically upgrade many of these systems so that they can continue to support our business. Further, we license the software programs supporting many of our systems from independent software developers. The inability or failure of these vendors, developers or us to continue to maintain and upgrade these systems and software programs or efficiently implement and integrate new systems could disrupt or reduce the efficiency of our operations or retain vulnerability exploitation risk if we were unable to convert to alternate systems in an efficient and timely manner and could expose us to greater risk of a successful attack. In addition, costs and delays for any reason associated with the implementation of new or upgraded systems and technology, including the migration of applications to the cloud, modernizing of legacy systems or our current implementation of our new point of sale system, or with maintenance or adequate support of existing systems also could disrupt or reduce the efficiency of our operations, fail to operate as designed, result in the potential loss or corruption of data or information or lost sales, cause business interruptions, inhibit our ability to innovate, and affect our ability to meet business and reporting requirements and adversely affect our profitability.

We routinely incur significant costs in complying with numerous and frequently changing laws and regulations. The complexity of this regulatory environment and related compliance costs continue to increase due to additional legal and regulatory requirements, our expanding operations, and increased regulatory scrutiny and enforcement efforts. New or revised laws, regulations, orders, policies and related interpretations and enforcement practices, particularly those dealing with the sale of products, including without limitation, product and food safety, marketing, labeling or pricing; information security and privacy; labor and employment; employee wages, salary levels and benefits; health and safety; real property; public accommodations; imports and customs; transportation; intellectual property; taxes; bribery and anti-corruption; climate change; and environmental compliance, may significantly increase our expenses or require extensive system and operating changes that could materially increase our cost of doing business. In 2023, we invested approximately $150 million in retail labor, primarily through labor hours, to further enhance our store standards, including on-shelf availability, and our compliance efforts as well as the customer and employee experience in our stores. Further, anticipated regulatory changes relating to the overtime exemptions under the Fair Labor Standards Act (in particular, the executive/managerial exemption) could result in increased labor costs to our business and negatively affect our operating results if changes to our business operations are required. Violations of applicable laws and regulations or untimely or incomplete execution of a required product recall can result in significant penalties (including loss of licenses, eligibility to accept certain government benefits such as SNAP or significant fines), class action or other litigation, governmental investigation or action and reputational damage. Additionally, changes in tax laws (including those related to the federal, state or foreign corporate tax rate), the interpretation of existing laws, or our failure to sustain our reporting positions on examination could adversely affect our overall effective tax rate. Furthermore, significant and/or rapid increases to federal and further increases to state and/or local minimum wage rates/salary levels could adversely affect our earnings if we are not able to otherwise offset these increased labor costs elsewhere in our business. Moreover, the adoption of new environmental laws and regulations in connection with climate change and the transition to a low carbon economy, including any federal or state laws enacted to regulate greenhouse gas emissions or require public disclosures related thereto (including the recently adopted SEC rules requiring certain disclosures relating to climate change), could significantly increase our operating or merchandise costs or reduce the demand for our products. These laws and regulations may include, but are not limited to, requirements relating to hazardous waste materials, recycling and recycled/recyclable product content, single-use plastics, extended producer responsibility, use of refrigerants, carbon pricing or carbon taxes, product energy efficiency standards and product labeling. If carbon pricing requirements or carbon taxes are adopted, there is a significant risk that the cost of merchandise from our suppliers will increase and adversely affect our business and results of operations.

Our business is subject to the risk of litigation or other legal proceedings by employees, consumers, suppliers, competitors, shareholders, unions, government agencies and others through private actions, class actions, multi-district litigation, arbitrations, derivative actions, administrative proceedings, regulatory actions or other litigation. For example, we are involved in certain legal proceedings as discussed in Note 7 to the consolidated financial statements. The outcome of legal proceedings, particularly class action or multi-district litigation or mass arbitrations and regulatory actions, can be difficult to assess or quantify. Plaintiffs in these types of lawsuits may seek recovery of very large or indeterminate amounts, and the magnitude of the potential loss may remain unknown for lengthy periods. In addition, certain of these matters, if decided adversely to us or settled by us and not covered by insurance, may result in liability material to our financial statements as a whole or may negatively affect our operating results if changes to our business operations are required, and sometimes these developments are unanticipated. Legal proceedings in general, and class actions, derivative actions, mass arbitrations, multi-district litigation, and governmental investigations and actions in particular, can be expensive and disruptive, and adverse publicity could harm our reputation, regardless of the validity of the allegations. As a result, legal proceedings may adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition. See also Note 7 to the consolidated financial statements.