Living between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains means that Hy-Vee grocery stores have probably been a part of your life for as long as you've been alive.

They are all over South Dakota, Minnesota, Nebraska, and Iowa (their home state). Even if they aren't your store of choice, you've for sure driven by them, eaten food bought there, and seen their television commercials.

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Hy-Vee came to Sioux Falls in the 1970s, with their first store at 26th and Sycamore on the east side. Back then that was also known as 'the edge of town.'

And as long as there have been Hy-Vees, we've been watching them sell their stuff on our TVs. Thanks to YouTube, we can take a trip through time with some of those commercials from the last 50-ish years.

Watch These Old Hy-Vee Commercials

We start our time-travel trip in the year of the bicentennial, 1976.

They got a great deal on grapefruits for nine cents. Yea, NINE CENTS.

How about a 19-cent mac and cheese dinner? What in the gosh darn heck?!?

Next, we jump ahead a decade to 1986. Mr. Mister was on the radio, Stand by Me was at the theater, and while you were watching Alf on the TV you probably saw this ad:

$20 could feed my family for a month (they REALLY like pizza).

Those chips are so cheap you could give every trick-or-treater a bag.

The next year, 1987, they were celebrating the founders of the Hy-Vee feast:

Don't forget to bring a quarter so you can live high on the margarine-hog.

Now we are up to the 90s. Grab your flannel and let's see what's on sale.

Gotta love that jingle.

You could cater your whole Labor Day cookout with the change in your car.

Next, we hop ahead a year to hear the tale of Craig and the huge load he is dropping...at a store in Minnesota.

This commercial is all about the breakthrough of picking up stuff in one place and taking it to another place.

Now we come to 1998. The look is more modern than we've seen. But that song is so serious. It's just groceries, slow your roll jingle singers.

Remember the good ol' days of five years ago when Hy-Vees were open 24 hours a day? We did not appreciate the golden age we were living in.

This spot from just after the turn of the century tell the story of the only arrow and how he found a home at Hy-Vee:

Don't be sad Mr, Down Arrow, you're the thing everyone is looking for.

I know it's not really accurate to look at the prices in these old commercials and compare them to today.

Sure $5.00 could get you to stock up on mac and cheese for the apocalypse. But the minimum wage at that time was, what, 25 cents an hour plus an old shoe?

In 1976 I could probably buy a house right next to that new store on 26th and Sycamore for what I paid for a HyChi two-entree meal today in 2023.

Oh well, time marches on.