ViableFood.org Local Grocery Estimator

About & Limitations

The ViableFood.org Local Grocery Estimator is a free screening tool that helps community leaders, store owners, and local advocates quickly assess the realistic annual sales potential of opening a new grocery store in a specific location. Please read the limitations below before relying on any output.

What This Tool Does

• Classifies the area as Urban or Rural using US Census tract density — Urban areas use a 1-mile trade radius, Rural areas use a 10-mile radius. No "small city" middle category is used.
• For Urban areas only, competitor stores within the selected boundary are further filtered by actual drive time using the free OSRM open-source router (max 8 minutes), so stores that are geographically close but road-inaccessible are excluded. Rural areas use straight-line boundary only.
• Estimates the Total Addressable Market (TAM) using US Census ACS household counts with a per-household grocery spend baseline adjusted for local median income — ranging from $5,200/HH (low-income areas) to $10,500/HH (high-income areas).
• Measures the shopping gap using USDA SNAP retailer history back to approximately 2005. The longer an area has gone without a full-service grocery store, the more suppressed Year 1–3 sales will be as shoppers have developed strong habits elsewhere. Areas with no historical record default to a 20+ year gap.
• Detects active competitors using the live USDA SNAP retailer database. Competition reduces projected capture proportionally — not as a flat deduction — preserving the year-over-year growth trajectory. Penalty rates: 20% per grocery competitor in urban areas, 10% in rural areas, 3% per convenience/dollar store, capped at a maximum 65% total reduction.
• Projects a 3-year capture range with a proportional uncertainty band (±20% of each year's estimate, 2–5 percentage points). Both percentage and estimated dollar figures are shown. A viability warning appears if any year's lower bound reaches 0%.
• Allows competitor exclusions — if you know a store in the list is permanently closed or no longer operating, you can uncheck it to remove its effect from the estimate.

Why Gap Years Matter

A common mistake when opening community grocery stores is assuming that shoppers will return immediately on opening day. In reality, when a neighborhood has been without a grocery store for years, families develop strong habits of traveling to stores far away. This tool adjusts Year 1–3 projections based on gap length to protect planners from dangerous overestimations of opening-year revenue.

Gap categories: 0–1 years (mild impact, 20/25/30% base capture), 2–4 years (moderate, 15/20/25%), 5+ years (severe, 10/15/20%). You can override the auto-detected gap category using the dropdown after analysis.

Data Sources

• US Census Bureau ACS 5-Year Estimates (2022 vintage) — household counts, median income, SNAP participation by census tract, via the Census public API.
• USDA SNAP Retailer Location Data (Historical, ~2005–present) — store openings and closures used to calculate gap years, stability history, and past closures.
• USDA SNAP Retailer Location Data (Live, via USDA ArcGIS) — currently authorized SNAP retailers used for active competitor detection and mapping.
• OpenStreetMap / Nominatim — free address geocoding (no API key required).
• US Census TIGERweb — census tract boundaries for urban/rural classification and population queries.
• OSRM Public Routing Server — free open-source routing used for urban drive-time competitor filtering (no API key required; falls back to straight-line if unavailable).

Known Limitations

• Trade area is a straight-line boundary, not a drive-time polygon. You can use a radius circle or draw a custom polygon. Only competitor detection (urban only) uses drive time — the household and TAM calculations always use the full selected boundary regardless of road access.
• SNAP-authorized stores only. Competitor detection uses the USDA SNAP database. Non-SNAP grocery stores, stores that recently lost SNAP authorization, or stores that have not yet been added to the database will not appear.
• Income-adjusted spend is still an approximation. The $5,200–$10,500/HH tiers are based on broad income brackets. Actual household grocery spend varies by family size, dietary preferences, and local cost of living in ways this tool cannot fully capture.
• Census data lags reality. ACS 5-year estimates use surveys from prior years and may not reflect recent population changes, new housing developments, or demographic shifts.
• The capture range carries estimation uncertainty. The ±20% proportional band is a modeling assumption, not a statistically derived confidence interval. Actual results depend heavily on store execution, pricing, marketing, and community engagement.
• Gap default of 20+ years is a floor, not a measurement. Areas with no USDA record since 2005 may have had stores close before that date. The actual gap could be longer.
• No daytime population, tourism, or seasonal adjustment. Areas with significant non-resident activity (college towns, tourist areas, employment centers) may have higher realistic potential than shown.
• The 65% competitor penalty cap is a modeling assumption. Even in heavily competed markets, a well-differentiated community store can capture some share. The cap prevents the model from showing an unrealistically zero result but should not be interpreted as a guarantee of viability.

This tool is a starting point for community conversation, not a final business decision. It is not formal financial advice and should not replace a commissioned feasibility study conducted by a professional analyst familiar with your specific market.

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