Dollar General store remains closed after severe rodent, insect infestation

Nearly two weeks after state inspectors forced a Dollar General on River Street in Plains Township shut, the store was still dark, a sign that the fallout from a rodent and insect infestation was not just a cleanup problem but a work problem for the people who staff it.

The Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Food Safety and Laboratory Services ordered the store immediately closed on April 21 after an inspection found rodent droppings on the food shelves. A follow-up report said the droppings were described as “too numerous to count,” a detail that shows how far the sanitation breakdown had gone inside a store that sells groceries, pet food and other everyday essentials.

For Dollar General employees, a shutdown like this can hit in several ways at once. Associates can lose hours while the store is closed, district leaders may have to reroute labor and inventory, and store managers have to line up pest control, deep cleaning and reinspection before the doors reopen. In a small-format store where workers already juggle stocking, register coverage and back-room organization, a pest problem adds another layer of pressure to an already tight operation.

The company’s scale makes the disruption more than local. Dollar General said in its annual report materials that it operated 20,893 stores as of January 30, 2026, across the United States and Mexico. Those stores sell food, health and wellness products, cleaning and laundry supplies, self-care and beauty items, which means sanitation failures can spread quickly from the back room to the sales floor and into the customer experience.

The closure also lands against a broader safety backdrop. In July 2024, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration announced a corporate-wide settlement with Dollar General that included $12 million in penalties and required the company to strengthen its safety structure, create a Safety Operations Center, maintain a hotline for safety concerns, and correct covered hazards generally within 48 hours. The settlement also called for annual unannounced audits and employee safety training, a reminder that problems inside a store should be reported and fixed before they reach the level of a state shutdown.

Pennsylvania has already seen another Dollar General closure this spring. On March 21, a store in Harrisburg was ordered shut over rodent infestation and gross facility and equipment sanitation violations. For workers in Plains Township and beyond, the message is blunt: when basic cleanliness fails, the cost shows up in lost hours, extra labor, and a store that cannot open until the problem is truly gone.