Research

My research focuses on how food retail markets and consumer food decisions interact and contribute to economic outcomes across communities. I also study the role of data infrastructure in supporting evidence-based food policy, including efforts to increase transparency and public access to high-quality datasets through initiatives like DemocratizingData.ai.

I use high-resolution data, including scanner data, retail census data, and other micro-level datasets, to study how market structure, firm behavior, and public policy affect consumers, retailers, and researchers.

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Food Retail Markets, Competition, and Food Access

This area of my research examines food retailer competition, pricing, and variation in the food options available across communities. Much of this work focuses on the changing food retail landscape, including dollar stores, food deserts, retail markups, store profitability, and public policies that influence food access.

Selected publications

Dollar-Store Impact on Local Labor Markets and Retail Activity
Chenarides, L., T. J. Richards, Z. Rutledge, and J. Pender. 2025. Food Policy.
Published version

Retail Markups and Discount-Store Entry
Chenarides, L., M. I. Gomez, T. J. Richards, and K. Yonezawa. 2023. Review of Industrial Organization.
Published version

Dynamic Model of Entry: Dollar Stores
Chenarides, L., M. Çakir, and T. J. Richards. 2023. American Journal of Agricultural Economics.
Published version

Food Retail Profits, Competition, and the Great Recession
Cleary, R. O., and L. Chenarides. 2022. Agribusiness: An International Journal.
Published version

Dollar Stores and Food Deserts
Chenarides, L., C. Cho, R. M. Nayga, Jr., and M. R. Thomsen. 2021. Applied Geography.
Published version

If You Build Them…Will it Matter? Food Stores’ Presence and Perceived Barriers to Purchasing Healthy Foods in the Northeastern U.S.
Chenarides, L., A. Bonanno, and A. Palmer. 2020. Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy.
Published version

Documenting the Link between Poor Food Access and Less Healthy Product Assortment across the U.S.
Chenarides, L., and E. C. Jaenicke. 2018. Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy.
Published version

Store Formats, Market Structure, and Consumers’ Food Shopping Decisions
Volpe, R. J., III, E. C. Jaenicke, and L. Chenarides. 2018. Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy.
Published version

Store Profitability and Public Policies to Improve Food Access in Non-Metro U.S. Counties
Cleary, R. O., A. Bonanno, L. Chenarides, and S. J. Goetz. 2018. Food Policy.
Published version

Working papers and ongoing research

Market Structure and Price Markups in Food Retail
Chenarides, L., J. Lowrey, R. J. Volpe, and A. Okrent.

Food Retailer Pricing Behavior Under Anti-Price Gouging Laws: Evidence from Scanner Data
Chenarides, L., and T. J. Richards.

Dollar Stores, SNAP, and Food Access
Chenarides, L., and C. Ambrozek.

Data Democratization and Evidence-Based Policy

This area of my research studies how access to data, research infrastructure, and publication systems affect the questions researchers can ask and the evidence available for public policy. This work includes data linkages, evidence-based policymaking, machine learning, federal data infrastructure, and open-access publication models.

Selected publications

A Review of Data Linkages for Policy-Informing Research in Food and Agricultural Economics
Chenarides, L., A. S. Hanks, J. Berard, A. Carlson, G. Davis, and A. Finaret. 2025. Food Policy.
Published version

Machine Learning in Applied Economics and Agribusiness: Emerging Applications and Integration with Traditional Methods
Maruejols, L., X. Yu, and L. Chenarides. 2025. International Food and Agribusiness Management Review.
Published version

Federal Economic Data on Local and Regional Food Producers
Bauman, A., B. B. R. Jablonski, D. A. Yeh, L. Chenarides, and D. Thilmany McFadden. 2024. Journal of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
Published version

Creating Engagements: Bringing the User into Data Democratization
Chenarides, L. 2024. Harvard Data Science Review.
Published version

An Outlook on Evidence-Based Policymaking
Chenarides, L., A. Hanks, A. Finaret, A. Carlson, and G. Davis. 2024. Choices.
Published version

Grand Challenge: To Ensure That All People Have Safe, Affordable, Accessible, and Acceptable Food for Leading a Healthy and Active Life
Wilson, N., L. Chenarides, J. Kolodinsky, and K. Boys. 2024. Choices.
Published version

Working papers and ongoing research

Data-Usage Descriptors as Search Metadata: The Case of Food Security Data and the National Data Platform, 2015–2025
Chenarides, L., R. Ladislau, M. Parashar, D. Hook, S. Porter, and J. Lane.

The Economic Trade-offs between Subscription-Based and Open-Access Publication Models
Bryan, C., L. Chenarides, J. I. Lane, and M. Wang.

Teaching and public-facing scholarship

Some of my work also focuses on teaching, experiential learning, and public-facing communication.

Integrating Experiential Learning into a Systems Framework: An Application to Promote Food Deserts and Food Access Concepts Among College Students
Shaw-Hughner, R., C. Dumitrescu, L. Chenarides, C. Wharton, and G. Lacagnina. 2021. Applied Economics Teaching Resources. Published version

Using a Sensory Learning Framework to Design Effective Curricula: Evidence from Indigenous Nutrition Education Programs
Green, K., and L. Chenarides. 2020. Sustainability.
Published version

Are dollar stores the villains they’ve been made out to be?
Chenarides, L. 2022. Fast Company.
Article

Dollar Store: Friend or Foe?
Chenarides, L. 2019. Arizona Food Industry Journal.

Full publication list

For a complete and current list of publications, working papers, grants, and presentations, please see my CV.