Word.ws English Dictionary

dark store

dark store noun: a distribution center, usually a large warehouse, not open to the public, containing the physical goods sold by the online operations of a supermarket or other retail outlet.

Noun

dark store (plural dark stores)

  1. A distribution center, usually a large warehouse, not open to the public, containing the physical goods sold by the online operations of a supermarket or other retail outlet.
    • "Food online is growing really well for us," said Towle adding it would need "tens" rather than "hundreds" of dark stores as it will also continue to pick orders from normal supermarkets.2012 September 24, Zoe Wood, quoting Ken Towle, “Tesco expands 'dark stores' programme to cash in on online shopping boom”, in The Guardian
    • In Battersea, in southwest London, Vito Parrinello, a manager of several dark stores who until recently managed Italian restaurants, is determined that the delivery riders not disturb their new neighbors.2021 July 27, Eshe Nelson, “Groceries in 10 Minutes: Delivery Start-Ups Crowd City Streets Across Globe”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

Forms of dark store

pluraldark stores

Origin of dark store

From dark (“not open to the public”) + store. The modifier dark refers to the fact that a dark store is not open to the public and is so to speak an invisible part of the retailer’s operation, not to a presumed lack of light in the building.

Questions about dark store

What does dark store mean?
Dark store means a distribution center, usually a large warehouse, not open to the public, containing the physical goods sold by the online operations of a supermarket or other retail outlet.
What part of speech is dark store?
Dark store is a noun.
What is the plural of dark store?
The plural of dark store is dark stores.

Words near dark store in the dictionary

  1. dark space
  2. dark spaces
  3. dark spinach
  4. dark star
  5. dark stars
  6. dark store
  7. dark stores
  8. dark territories
  9. dark territory
  10. dark thirty
  11. dark tourism

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dark store (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “dark store.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dark_store. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.