Independent grocery stores: count, owners and sales

Independent grocery stores have no public count of their own. No federal series published each year separates them from chains, so this brief reads the closest proxies the U.S. Census Bureau publishes. Its County Business Patterns counted 62,947 supermarkets and other grocery stores with paid employees in 2023, chains and independents together, 3% fewer than in 2017. The small, owner-run end of that count shrank faster: stores with fewer than five employees fell 10% and stores run by sole proprietors 23%. This brief sets those counts beside supermarket sales and grocery prices, for brands that sell into independent grocers.

Every chart below is built from published federal data: Census store counts and retail sales, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Consumer Price Index. The store counts run well behind the sales figures, and the newest is for 2023. The sources, with links to the tables behind each line, are at the foot of the page.

Independent grocery stores and the closest public proxies

County Business Patterns counts establishments: single locations with paid employees. A grocer with three stores counts three times, and a store its owner runs with no payroll is not counted at all. Census sorts the stores by kind of business, by how many people each location employs and by the owner's legal form. None of those says whether a store belongs to a chain.

So this brief leans on two signals. Stores with fewer than five employees stand in for the smallest operators. Stores owned by sole proprietors, one person running an unincorporated business, stand in for the most owner-run. Neither is a count of independents. Chains run small stores too, and an independent can be large. Plenty of independents are incorporated, so sole proprietorships are only a narrow slice of them.

The chart sets both signals against the count of all grocery stores, each rebased to 2017. All stores fell in each year to 2020, then edged up in each of the next three, ending 2023 1% above the 2020 low. Stores with fewer than five employees fell in every year except 2021 and were at their lowest on the chart in 2023. Stores run by sole proprietors fell in every year on the chart.

Did the small stores that dropped out of the count close, sell to a bigger operator, or hire a fifth employee? The count cannot tell those apart.

The smallest stores account for all of the decline

In 2017 Census counted 64,938 grocery stores, 23,055 of them with fewer than five employees. By 2023 there were 62,947, and 20,679 with fewer than five. The smallest stores fell by more than the total did, so the number with five or more employees rose a little. Stores with fewer than five employees are still about a third of all grocery stores.

Size classes count paid staff in the pay period that includes March 12, so a store moves between classes when its headcount changes. That shows in 2021, when the 100 to 249 class gained more than 1,400 stores and the 50 to 99 class lost about 1,000, in a year when the total barely moved. Most of that looks like existing stores reporting more staff, not new large stores opening. Stores with 100 to 249 employees ended 2023 12% above 2017.

The handful of stores with 1,000 or more employees have no count before 2020: Census marks that class as not available for those years.

If many of your independent doors are very small stores, is your door count shrinking with them, or are you finding new doors among the larger ones?

Who owns the stores

Census records the legal form of the company that owns each store. In 2023, C corporations, a group that includes the publicly traded chains, owned 29,628 grocery stores. S corporations, a tax status only companies with no more than 100 shareholders can elect, owned 23,261. Partnerships owned 4,890. Sole proprietors owned 4,777, fewer than one store in ten.

Sole proprietorships fell in every year, ending 23% below 2017. S corporations fell to 2020, then rose to their highest on the chart, 3% above 2017. C corporations fell in every year to 2022 and rose in 2023, ending 2% below 2017. Partnerships stayed in a narrow band until 2022.

Then, between 2022 and 2023, stores owned by partnerships fell from 5,694 to 4,890, while stores owned by C corporations rose from 28,778 to 29,628. The two moves are close in size. Did some owners change legal form, rather than stores opening and closing? Census files each store under its owner's form in each year, so the count cannot say.

The corporation lines mix independents with chains and say little about independents on their own. The sole proprietorship line is the plainest public signal of owner-run stores, and it fell in every year. Are those owners closing, selling, or incorporating as they grow? Each answer means something different for a brand's account list.

Supermarket sales against grocery prices

Census's monthly retail survey publishes sales for supermarkets and other grocery stores, but not by chain or independent. These are all supermarkets together, in current dollars, and they include whatever else supermarkets sell besides food. Census does not seasonally adjust this series, so the chart compares each month with the same month a year earlier. Even then, a single month can swing with the calendar, such as how many weekends it has, so read the run of months rather than one.

In July 2026, the latest month Census has published, supermarket sales were 1.0% above July 2025. Food at home prices rose 2.7% over the same twelve months. A year earlier the order was reversed: in July 2025, sales were up 3.5% and prices 2.2%. Census marks July 2026 as preliminary, so it will be revised. The price line runs a month further: in the year to August 2026, food at home prices rose 2.2%.

Sales have grown more slowly than prices in every month from November 2025 to July 2026, the longest such run since 2023. The run in 2022 and 2023 was longer and the gap far wider: sales trailed prices in every month from February 2022 to December 2023, and in August 2022, when food at home prices were 13.5% above a year earlier, supermarket sales were up 6.5%. From January 2024 to September 2025, sales outran prices in all but three months.

BLS published no consumer price index for October 2025, so the price line breaks there.

When sales grow more slowly than prices, the same dollars buy fewer groceries. That is a rough sign, not a measure of volume: the price index covers food bought anywhere, and the sales cover more than food. It can mean supermarkets are selling fewer items, or cheaper ones, or losing trips to other kinds of store. Which is happening in your category, and is it the same at independent stores as at the chains?

What's next for brands in the channel

The public count shows a grocery store base that is roughly steady but thinner at its smallest end, and its newest year is 2023. Your own account list is more current. How many of your independent doors are very small stores, and how many have you gained or lost since 2017? Losses among the smallest stores match the public signal. Losses among larger ones are worth a closer look.

Supermarket dollars have grown more slowly than food prices since November 2025. If your dollar sales through independents are flat, your units may be falling, and a price increase can hide that. Look at units and price per unit by account before you plan the next increase.

A store that changes owner or legal form can drop off a distributor's account list or a broker's route without ever closing. Does your account list follow the store, or the old owner's account number?

Distributor reports, broker visits and the stores themselves each see part of the channel. Which independent doors does no report you get cover at all?

Scout reads the retailer portals and syndicated feeds these questions need. To see what the numbers look like for your own brand, ask below.