Most small stores in those areas of DC can’t afford to stay in business because of the insurance, taxes and inventory shrinkage. Walmart was a natural choice to provide affordable priced food and household goods and they are fighting it after they all approved it.
I wish smaller retailers could succeed but unless you can pay your own police force and expect a shrinkage rate of at least 2% (which is almost total profit margin), you can’t really do business. When I lived in dc, the closest place was a mini-mart with everything, I mean everything behind bulletproof glass. The milk, the eggs, the bread, the juice was all behind the glass and you had to ask for it. You didn’t have a choice and the basics cost almost double what they did in the burbs. One time I was walking by and there was a guy hitting the glass with a hammer because he didn’t like the outcome of a scratch-off lottery ticket.
The closest supermarket had like five aisles and people would shoplift and sell the stuff outside the store for half price.
There is a reason small stores can’t succeed.
Walmart is part of the symptom, not the solution.