[1] The goal was to leverage the volume of purchasing power of the cooperative to negotiate better prices from wholesalers and therefore improve their competitiveness.

[3] The cooperative was originally named District Grocery Society, as visible in its early advertisements.

The membership fee to join was $2,500, and the distance between other members' stores could not be less than two city blocks.

However, as the number grew, the ads started referencing the local phone book to find the nearest DGS store.

[8] The free deliveries were handled by the cooperative using its fleet of orange DGS trucks.

Make your selection of crisp, dewy fresh produce, nationally-known groceries and tender, high-quality meats, cut for your individual, specific needs.

This allowed the store to remain open for very long hours and offered plenty of labor to serve the customers with children helping their parents when not in school.

[2] The first generation often spoke Yiddish as a first language and learned English while interacting with customers and reading labels on canned goods.

The second-generation was expected to help in the store but were also attending local schools where they learned English.

Between 1880 and 1924, European Jews immigrated to the United States in mass fleeing poverty and antisemitism in Europe.

Several hundreds of these newcomers would open these small "Mom and Pop" neighborhood grocery stores as they required only a limited start-up capital and only some English.

[2] There were several Yiddish newspapers available in the Washington, D.C., area, including The Forward and many store owners were very involved in the local synagogues and the life of the Jewish community.

[5][6] DGS's size allowed it to oppose the antisemitism its members experienced in business and social relations by threatening to boycott food manufacturers that engaged in discriminatory practices.

[15] Starting in 1926, the annual banquets became an important part of the year for many grocers and their families around the city.

On April 28, 1942, the newly opened DGS warehouse hosted a show featuring George Jessel, Sophie Tucker, Imogen Carpenter and Betty Bruce, which was organized to sell War Bonds and Stamps.

[12] 1921: The District Grocery Society was started in the store of Mike Hornstein located on 18th Street NW.

[20] January 3, 1944: Paul D. Kaufman succeeds Isaac Jacobson as president of DGS.

[23] April 3, 1952: The District Grocery Stores elect their first female director, Sarah Smotrich (who operates Sara's Market), to a two-year term.

[25] June 1, 1955: DGS merges with Nation-Wide Food Stores, another grocers cooperative founded in 1936.

[2] September 1, 1955: Following the resignation of Louis Fox that same day, Sam Klein becomes president of DGS.

[29] April 4–8, 1968: In 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, leading to major riots in Washington DC.

The following week, a second group of former members formed the Farm House-DGS label with funding from M. Loeb Corp., a Canadian wholesaler.

Hundreds of people gathered for the exhibit's opening, many having grown up in the stores or shopped there in their childhood.

[33] In 2012, the Washington, D.C., restaurant DGS Delicatessen in Dupont Circle paid homage to the memory of the local "Mom and Pop" grocery store when it opened,.