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Bottom Dollar Closes For Good In Pittsburgh

PITTSBURGH (KDKA)- All 66 Bottom Dollar stores are now officially closed, including the 20 stores here in Pittsburgh.

Bottom Dollar was sold to Aldi in November. They announced all Bottom Dollar stores would close by Jan. 15.

All of the discount grocery stores were out of stock and decided to close three days early. Bottom Dollar says any left over food or items will be donated to food banks and charity.

Thousands of employees lost their jobs with the closing of Bottom Dollar.

However, Aldi says it plans on opening 650 new stores nationwide, creating some 10,000 new jobs.

For now, there is no word on what will happen to the former Bottom Dollar locations in Pittsburgh. Some neighborhoods are worried, because Bottom Dollar was the only grocery store they had in their neighborhood.

Like the store in Friendship. Residents there are hoping to encourage Aldi to open one of their stores in place of the Bottom Dollar.

"Aldi notified the city yesterday that they would like to come to a meeting here in the community," said Richard Swartz, of the Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation. "Aldi is still deliberating whether they want to have a store at this site."

"One reason Aldi may decide not to open in the old Bottom Dollar location is because they actually already have a store, located just about a half a mile away."

"So for Aldi, the question is, if they make an investment in a second store as close as to their current store, are they going to capture a larger share of the grocery shopping market?" said Swartz.

Swartz says the meeting with Aldi will take place within the next week. Not having a grocery store is not an option for them.

"We may have an opportunity to find another grocery retailer if Aldi decides they're not going to open a store here," he said.

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