Company store

Company stores served numerous additional functions, as well, such as a locus for the government post office, and as the cultural and community center where people could freely gather.

In song, folktale, and union rhetoric the company store was often cast as a villain, a collector of souls through perpetual debt peonage.

In Mexico, during the Porfiriato period (late 1800 to early 1900), the "tiendas de raya" (company stores) were a prominent symbol of labor and peasant exploitation.

These stores, operated by the owners of haciendas or factories, sold essential items to workers, often at inflated prices and typically paying with vouchers instead of cash.

This kept workers in a continuous debt cycle to the hacienda or company, binding them almost like slaves to the land or industrial work without the possibility of escaping poverty.

A notable instance of the oppressive nature of tiendas de raya occurred in the early 1900s at Río Blanco, Veracruz, home to Mexico's largest cotton mill.

By his order, the tiendas de raya were eliminated across the country, marking a significant shift in the fight for social and economic justice.