Americas
Bolivia – Bolivia's Empresa de Apoyo a la Producción de Alimentos (Emapa, Food Production Support Company), which includes a supermarket chain, is state-owned. [7] [8] 
Cuba – Most grocery stores in Cuba have been state-owned for decades, due to the government monopoly on retail. Since 2021, some small- and medium-size privately owned grocery stores have been allowed to exist, but typically remain unaffordable for the majority of Cubans. [9] 
Greenland – In some remote areas of Greenland, state-owned grocery stores provide food and other commodities imported from Denmark and other countries. [10] Pilersuisoq is KNI's grocery retail store chain. [11]
United States – Each branch of the United States Armed Forces owns and operates its own public grocery system known as a PX or exchange, which is open to members of the military, and provides goods and services. The exchange includes military grocery stores known as commissaries. [12] In alcoholic beverage control states, liquor stores are owned by the state government. [13] During the 21st century, several cities in the United States have operated or have plans to open city-owned grocery stores, including cities in Florida, Illinois, Kansas, and Wisconsin. [14] Many stores that have received subsidies have closed within a few years or failed to open. [15] Some federally recognized American Indian tribes operate their own grocery stores. The Citizen Potawatomi Nation and the Choctaw Nation own tribal grocery stores in Oklahoma. [16] The Citizen Potawatomi Nation's FireLake Foods in Shawnee, Oklahoma, is the largest tribal grocery store in the United States. [17] In the 21st century, some food infrastructure advocates have supported the establishment of grocery stores through public–private partnerships to address negative effects associated with food deserts. [4] 
Florida – Baldwin Market in Baldwin, Florida was owned and operated by the city. The grocery store was purchased by the city in 2019 and operated until March 2024, when it closed. [18] 
Illinois – Launched in 2012, the Illinois Fresh Food Fund supported the opening of six grocery stores in food deserts. [19] As of 2024, four of them had closed. [15] In 2023, Rise Community Market opened in Cairo, Illinois. [20] In 2024, ProPublica reported on the store's financial struggles, citing that in the first half of the year, it averaged less than half its required sales to break even. [15] In 2023, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson announced that Chicago would explore the possibility of a city-owned grocery store. [21] The following year, a feasibility study conducted for the city described the municipal grocery store model as "necessary, feasible and implementable." [22] In 2025, city officials announced that they did not apply for state funding for the municipal grocery store, and instead plan to open multiple city-run markets throughout the city. [23] [24] In January 2024, [25] the Grocery Initiative Act came into effect. [26] It authorized the Illinois Grocery Initiative, which aims to address inadequate access to fresh foods, particularly in food deserts, through grants to establish new grocery stores in food deserts and grants to upgrade equipment in existing stores. [27] In 2025, the city of Venice, Illinois received a $2.4 million state grant from the initiative to build a grocery store. The city plans to own the building and lease it to private investors. [28] 
Kansas – In Kansas, several grocery stores are community-supported, municipality-owned, or city-run. In rural Kansas, local governments and communities had stepped in to own and operate grocery stores as private owners have retired. St. Paul Supermarket in St. Paul, is a municipality-owned business. [29] In May 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the city of Erie bought the Stub's Market grocery store in order to prevent the store from closing. The store was renamed to Erie Market. [30] In September 2024, citing high costs of running the store, the city announced that Erie Market would be leased to River Grocery LLC, which would take over operations and management. [31] 
New York – Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City in the 2025 election, has called for the creation of city-owned grocery stores in New York City. [32] Mamdani's proposal is to have a pilot program where 5 public grocery stores are opened, one in each borough. [13] To fund the city-owned grocery stores, Mamdani proposed to redirect funds from the Food Retail Expansion to Support Health (FRESH) program. He claimed that FRESH spends $140 million and that the city-owned grocery stores would take less than half of that. Newspaper columnist Timothy P. Carney noted that a report by the office of the New York City Comptroller stated the program had only given around $30 million in tax breaks since inception and had an average yearly cost of $3.3 million. [33] [34] Criticism of the proposal has also come from private business owners, including bodega owners. The organization United Bodegas of America and John Catsimatidis, a billionaire owner of a supermarket chain, have criticized public grocery stores as harmful to private businesses and their workers. [35] 
Wisconsin – Madison, Wisconsin has plans to open its first city-owned grocery store in a food desert on Madison's South Side, operated by Maurer's Urban Market. Originally scheduled to open by the end of 2023, [36] the store is estimated to open in mid-2025. [37]
Venezuela – During the administration of Hugo Chávez, many supermarkets were nationalized in 2010. [38] These supermarkets were among his administration's more popular policies. [39] Poor and low-income shoppers were more likely to frequent government-owned supermarkets, while wealthier shoppers more often frequented privately owned supermarkets. [40] When oil prices collapsed during the administration of Chávez's successor Nicolás Maduro, state-owned supermarkets struggled to import food during the economic crisis. [39] The Bicentenario supermarket chain in Venezuela was formerly owned by the state. [41] Nationalized under the administration of Hugo Chávez, the chain was later reprivatized. [42]
