Why Walgreens And CVS Are Shutting Down Thousands Of Stores

"We jacked up prices and made customer service worse, why is our business failing!?"

No insurance should be able to dictate where you can fill your prescription. It let's conglomerates suffocate competion.

I worked at Walgreens for 12 years. Corporate used shrinkage as part of unrealistic profit goals to not give raises while store managers and upper management were given ridiculously high bonuses. When they went to a rewards program, employees were highly stressed to push that over keeping customers happy. We were pushed to get as much customer information as possible while getting yelled at on a daily basis. Chain/corporate pharmacies are terrible. The pharmaceutical control over this government should sincerely be investigated. But that'll never happen.

Healthcare being for profit is the problem. It was never a mystery.

I quit shopping at CVS and Walgreens over a decade ago, if not longer. Why in the world would I pay such high prices when I can get the same item at Walmart or Costco for a fraction of their prices? I went into CVS to get a flu shot last season and couldn't get over the prices. The markups are astronomical!

Not only did they lock up the soap, they reduced staff so the person the responds to your request to unlock is the same person restocking and checking out customers.

For nearly 20 years, we went to the same local pharmacy. Then one day, I showed up and they were permanently closed w/o notice to staff nor customers. Without our input, our prescriptions were sent to the nearby Walgreens. For 10 years, I have seen a turnover of pharmacists, aids, and counter. Hours can be sketchy. And staffing is poor. A former employee who now works at another, said he left because he was getting $16.00/hr. It is no wonder why customer service is less than consistent. Frankly, I don't care about their profits. For-profit healthcare is ghoulish, gruesome and immoral.

Walgreens bought the drugstore in my hometown only to just shut it down and transferring all the prescription data to a store that was 20 miles away. Their plan backfired when a citizen of our small town was going to school to be a pharmacist they graduated the same year Walgreens did this. They then opened up a drugstore across the street from the drugstore that Walgreens bought and now sits empty.

I often see a CVS and a Walgreens directly across the street from each other.

The insurance industry is dismantling this country piece by piece. They have a complete stranglehold on everything we purchase... on every decision we have to make. It's insane how much power they wield.

Price gouging. Every time I want to buy from Walgreens or CVS, the prices are always double than what Amazon is. Batteries at Walgreens or CVS are just blatant price gouging!!!

1. Make the stores smaller. 2. Sell alot less crap. 3. Stop trying to be the dollar store of pharmacies.

At my Walgreens they charge $3.50 for Gatorade, the same Gatorade you can get for $1.79 just down the street

One thing, I think people are not figuring in on this. The photo department used to bring in a ton of traffic into the stores. As everyone went digital. The need for have photos in about an hours was gone, and the price of film has skyrocketed.

The problem with this industry is over-saturation. There are pharmacies on practically every corner and in every major grocery store.

They oversaturated the market there’s like five on every corner not to mention everything in there is extremely expensive

I had to stop going to Walgreens because I am dying of liver cancer. I take strong painkillers. Walgreens on a Friday, after the closing of my Dr. office, decided that "I think something less strong ...such as ibuprofen, will help relieve your pain better so I am gonna call your DR. back on Monday to suggest this and I am holding off filing this until I get another confirmation about filling this prescription." I WAS BEYOND ANGRY.....I have been getting my prescriptions at a small pharmacy with better customer service and less judgment from young, healthy, ignorant pharmacists.

I live in Rochester, NY and in my neighborhood area, Walgreens decided to plant a large store across the street from Wegmans. Really bad idea. That Walgreens was open for only two years, and the building has been sitting vacant for nearly ten years. They didn't understand their competition or they underestimated it.

7:50 tell me lady, why would any business choose to stay open in poor areas where they are getting hit left and right by shoplifters? They’re a pharmacy not a charity.

As a retired Walgreens store manager of 35 years the blame for this is rooted in reimbursement rates that have been shrinking for years. Pharmacy Benefits Management companies control and set these rates. Walgreens problem was not knowing how to offset these declines. They have been in a futile race to reduce expenses enough to compensate for this. That’s why stores are understaffed and overwhelmed. CVS decided to actually buy a PBM to deal with this reality. PBM’s are a horrible idea that has destroyed community pharmacy in the US.