The 5 & 10, 5 & dime, dime store or variety store was a 20th century institution in the Forty-Eight States, Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. Originating late in the 19th century, a majority of America's 5 & 10 stores started out with locations in Pennsylvania. The Keystone State can lay claim to the development of four major chains; F.W. Woolworth, J.G. McCrory, J.J. Newberry and G.C. Murphy.

5 & 10s, as a whole, survived the Great Depression unscathed. They went on to junior-anchor many an early mall-type shopping center. In fact, America's very first mall, Seattle's NORTHGATE CENTER, featured J.J. Newberry and F.W. Woolworth as two of its charter tenants. The third shopping mall in the nation, Greater Los Angeles' LAKEWOOD CENTER, housed an F.W. Woolworth in its first stage of stores.

By the mid-1960s, the trusty "5 & dime" was a standard feature of an American shopping mall. Often, there would be two stores -of different nameplates- within a single shopping complex. Of course, in that day and age, a shopping mall was conceived and operated as a middle-market, everything in one place place. By the late '70s, the focus had shifted toward a preponderance of fashion and shoe store tenants. The trusty "mall" 5 & 10 began to disappear.

A few established mall 5 & 10 stores would survive into the late 1990s. However, by the turn of the 20th century, the typical mall-based dime store, and the 5 & 10 in general, had been relegated to misty, water-colored memory.