Pitfalls, Persistence and Progress in Transforming Dollar Stores
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1. Clearya Scan Results: Chemicals of concern are found in beauty, personal care and cleaning products
2. Lead is again found in dollar store products
3. PVC, the "Poison Plastic," is widely available at dollar stores - including in the toy aisle
4. BPS Found in all Thermal Receipts - A classic case of regrettable substitution
5. No PFAS in Microwaveable Popcorn Samples - an important step toward eliminating 'forever chemicals' from our food
In 2024, the Campaign for Healthier Solutions invited community members across the country to purchase everyday products from Dollar Tree, Dollar General and Family Dollar and submit them to the Ecology Center lab to be screened for chemicals of concern. Campaign supporters also downloaded the Clearya app and scanned dollar store product labels for the presence of potential chemicals of concern in early 2025, later verifying the results via the Clearya Insights platform. This community-driven product screening project is meant to hold dollar stores accountable to the public commitments they have made to remove priority chemicals from their supply chain, and urge them to expand their restricted substances lists and seek safer solutions.
Our findings show that dollar stores continue to profit from the sale of products containing chemicals of concern. 46 out of 130 products purchased at major dollar stores in the personal care, beauty, baby, and cleaning sections were shown by the Clearya Insights platform to contain chemicals of concern, and 10 of these products contained chemicals prohibited or restricted in Europe or Canada; Separate lab testing of an additional 217 products detected lead in five children’s electronics and three common holiday-themed items purchased at dollar stores, showing that Dollar Tree and Dollar General’s existing policies to restrict lead must be strengthened; One quarter of these 217 products contained high levels of chlorine, indicating that they are made from the “poison plastic” PVC. In 2021, Dollar Tree publicly committed to prohibit PVC plastic in private-brand children’s products and encourage its suppliers to restrict the use of PVC in children’s products by 2024. We purchased 11 children’s products at Dollar Tree/ Family Dollar and 10 children’s products at Dollar General that were confirmed to be made with PVC; Receipts at both Dollar Tree and Dollar General were found to contain bisphenol S (BPS), a compound linked to reproductive harms that was recently banned by the state of Washington. There was also some good news. Our previous testing revealed the presence of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in microwavable popcorn packaging sold at dollar stores. But all the popcorn brands we purchased for testing in 2025 contained no detectable levels of fluorine - indicating that they are PFAS free. This speaks to the power of advocacy and consumer engagement. This report provides safe shopping tips, highlights loopholes in federal law that allow companies to sell products containing chemicals of concern, and outlines actionable recommendations for dollar stores to better protect their customers.
