4 ms·

The modern 'drug store' kinda baffles me. Compared to a grocery - worse selection of grocery items and drugs, worse laid out, at worse prices. Then I wonder w

The modern 'drug store' kinda baffles me. Compared to a grocery - worse selection of grocery items and drugs, worse laid out, at worse prices. Then I wonder who they are trying to cater to. If it's a smaller and quicker grocery experience, they're competing with nearly every dollar store and gas station. In my experience at least, they're often severely understaffed and not at all quicker. I guess grocery and online expanding into prescriptions, and the death of print photo were a one-two punch. What's interesting is that they've been declining for years, and at least to myself the consumer, don't appear to be trying to do anything different.

Molitor5901 2y ago
The entire point of a "modern drug store" is to fill prescriptions. All of those grocery items, etc. are there just to supplement the prescription business, which far and away is the bulk of revenue for that location. It's like gas stations that sell food.
- deadbabe 2y ago
  Why hasn’t someone created a pure prescription play with very small real estate and focused only on filling prescriptions?
  - datadrivenangel 2y ago
    You can't get a lease that small in most areas.
    - esafak 2y ago
      Why?
      - rincebrain 2y ago
        Because usually leases aren't new custom property sizes, they're of existing spaces, and if only your kind of thing will fit in there, why would they carve up their larger space to have spots that size?
    - deadbabe 2y ago
      Why not? Seems like there’d be a lot of use cases for it. Think small take-out only ghost kitchen setups.
  - dreamcompiler 2y ago
    These used to exist: Think of something like a drive-thru Starbucks that only dispenses prescriptions and you cannot walk inside. But I haven't seen one since the 80s.
- divbzero 2y ago
  Yes, and it’s only baffling now because the “modern drug store” is no longer the only game in town when it comes to filling prescription. Grocery stores (Safeway), big box stores (Walmart), wholesalers (Costco), and online retailers (Amazon) are all in on the business.
  - aworks 2y ago
    I switched my prescriptions from Walgreens to Safeway. Better service on medications and better selection of other stuff.
    - Molitor5901 2y ago
      I did the same away from CVS.
- scarface_74 2y ago
  There are a lot of drug store locations though that don’t have pharmacists and others where the pharmacists work limited hours compared to the rest of the store.
- teeray 2y ago
  This is also why the pharmacy counter is at the back of the store. They are praying that in your journey back there you find that you needed some cosmetic, a quart of half-and-half, can of Pringles, etc.
- bongodongobob 2y ago
  The gas station analogy is backwards. Gas stations exist to sell snacks, soda, and cigs. Gas is like 5% of profit.
- gottorf 2y ago
  > It's like gas stations that sell food. The bulk of the profit margin for gas stations come from things other than fuel sales, i.e. the convenience store.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
    Huh. No wonder. In .de that must have been because of their opening times, many of them 24/7. But that convenience stuff was always more expensive, and depending on your taste and preferences not especially desirable. Mostly tabac and alcoholics, I guess. That was pre-Covid. Post-covid full greedflation set in. Like two to five times more expensive, than the also more expensive stuff in supermarkets. Memories from about 1.5 years ago, for something on 'special sale' for €9,99(20 Deutsche Mark, Alder, Ey!), a 0,33L can of some whiskey-coke, which sells for about €2,50 to €3 normally. Bag of chips, €4,99(10 Mark!1!!), single candy bar, €3,99 WTF?! I don't see that to this level in the .us for comparable stuff.
- add-sub-mul-div 2y ago
  CVS retail prices for grocery and other miscellaneous items are so high that I want to stop everyone I see shopping there and lecture them about the math of buying elsewhere. Their membership offers a monthly store credit of $10 at a monthly cost of only $5 and it still barely feels worthwhile.
apwell23 2y ago
You don't have walk half a mile to the door and another qtr mile to back of the store to get a bottle of pepto bismol .
binarymax 2y ago
In theory they should work well in food deserts. But they are always overpriced and don’t vary stock from store to store, so can’t cater to varying income levels well. A family owned dollar store with pharma and fresh grocery would be a good replacement for many of these cookie cutter pharmacies that are disappearing.
bdcravens 2y ago
They do have a larger selection of many medical products. Fast vaccinations. Services like package drop off (CVS does UPS, Walgreens Fedex), bill pay, etc. While print photo isn't what it used to be, if you want a specialty photo printed like a larger size, it's pretty fast and cheap to do so (you can typically upload your photo and pick up in a couple of hours)
cvoss 2y ago
Some states have interesting quirks, such as Kentucky, where a grocery store cannot sell wine and spirits on premise (though they may do so via an adjacent secondary storefront). Kentucky pharmacies, however, may sell wine and spirits directly, which is a vestige of prohibition.
hibikir 2y ago
It comes down to two key forces that separate many American pharmacies from many other countries: Car-centric development and slow prescription filling. In American suburbia, having the smallest store possible isn't an advantage at all: We are mostly talking strip malls, where it takes some time to get in or out. The energy expenditure of leaving an arterial, parking and walking us much higher than just turning inside a store from a sidewalk in a trip you were already taking. This leads to minimal demand for stores that are very small, or sell cheap items. The smallest you are going to find is the restaurant with a drive-through, which is still quite big. The other issue is that instead of having most prescriptions in blisters, and a quick, automated dispensing system that lets you in an out of the store in seconds, American pharmacies just do way too much work to dispense medicine. Part is insurance and price variation, part regulation, and part just not having everything standardized and in blisters and bottles. So if you go to the pharmacy, you either call in advance, or you are going to sit there for a while. Both of those things are pushing you to sell something more in the pharmacy, so you get a build in convenience store, which is as bad at pricing as any other convenience store. The Spanish pharmacy, where you can get in and out in under a minute, and yet it's often seen as the first layer of the medical system for medical advice, is so much better, but it'd not make any sense given how the US is built, and how we regulate the pharmacy.

Molitor5901 2y ago

The entire point of a "modern drug store" is to fill prescriptions. All of those grocery items, etc. are there just to supplement the prescription business, which far and away is the bulk of revenue for that location. It's like gas stations that sell food.

deadbabe 2y ago
Why hasn’t someone created a pure prescription play with very small real estate and focused only on filling prescriptions?
- datadrivenangel 2y ago
  You can't get a lease that small in most areas.
  - esafak 2y ago
    Why?
    - rincebrain 2y ago
      Because usually leases aren't new custom property sizes, they're of existing spaces, and if only your kind of thing will fit in there, why would they carve up their larger space to have spots that size?
  - deadbabe 2y ago
    Why not? Seems like there’d be a lot of use cases for it. Think small take-out only ghost kitchen setups.
- dreamcompiler 2y ago
  These used to exist: Think of something like a drive-thru Starbucks that only dispenses prescriptions and you cannot walk inside. But I haven't seen one since the 80s.
divbzero 2y ago
Yes, and it’s only baffling now because the “modern drug store” is no longer the only game in town when it comes to filling prescription. Grocery stores (Safeway), big box stores (Walmart), wholesalers (Costco), and online retailers (Amazon) are all in on the business.
- aworks 2y ago
  I switched my prescriptions from Walgreens to Safeway. Better service on medications and better selection of other stuff.
  - Molitor5901 2y ago
    I did the same away from CVS.
scarface_74 2y ago
There are a lot of drug store locations though that don’t have pharmacists and others where the pharmacists work limited hours compared to the rest of the store.
teeray 2y ago
This is also why the pharmacy counter is at the back of the store. They are praying that in your journey back there you find that you needed some cosmetic, a quart of half-and-half, can of Pringles, etc.
bongodongobob 2y ago
The gas station analogy is backwards. Gas stations exist to sell snacks, soda, and cigs. Gas is like 5% of profit.
gottorf 2y ago
> It's like gas stations that sell food. The bulk of the profit margin for gas stations come from things other than fuel sales, i.e. the convenience store.
- LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
  Huh. No wonder. In .de that must have been because of their opening times, many of them 24/7. But that convenience stuff was always more expensive, and depending on your taste and preferences not especially desirable. Mostly tabac and alcoholics, I guess. That was pre-Covid. Post-covid full greedflation set in. Like two to five times more expensive, than the also more expensive stuff in supermarkets. Memories from about 1.5 years ago, for something on 'special sale' for €9,99(20 Deutsche Mark, Alder, Ey!), a 0,33L can of some whiskey-coke, which sells for about €2,50 to €3 normally. Bag of chips, €4,99(10 Mark!1!!), single candy bar, €3,99 WTF?! I don't see that to this level in the .us for comparable stuff.
add-sub-mul-div 2y ago
CVS retail prices for grocery and other miscellaneous items are so high that I want to stop everyone I see shopping there and lecture them about the math of buying elsewhere. Their membership offers a monthly store credit of $10 at a monthly cost of only $5 and it still barely feels worthwhile.

apwell23 2y ago

You don't have walk half a mile to the door and another qtr mile to back of the store to get a bottle of pepto bismol .

binarymax 2y ago

In theory they should work well in food deserts. But they are always overpriced and don’t vary stock from store to store, so can’t cater to varying income levels well. A family owned dollar store with pharma and fresh grocery would be a good replacement for many of these cookie cutter pharmacies that are disappearing.

bdcravens 2y ago

They do have a larger selection of many medical products. Fast vaccinations. Services like package drop off (CVS does UPS, Walgreens Fedex), bill pay, etc. While print photo isn't what it used to be, if you want a specialty photo printed like a larger size, it's pretty fast and cheap to do so (you can typically upload your photo and pick up in a couple of hours)

cvoss 2y ago

Some states have interesting quirks, such as Kentucky, where a grocery store cannot sell wine and spirits on premise (though they may do so via an adjacent secondary storefront). Kentucky pharmacies, however, may sell wine and spirits directly, which is a vestige of prohibition.

hibikir 2y ago

It comes down to two key forces that separate many American pharmacies from many other countries: Car-centric development and slow prescription filling. In American suburbia, having the smallest store possible isn't an advantage at all: We are mostly talking strip malls, where it takes some time to get in or out. The energy expenditure of leaving an arterial, parking and walking us much higher than just turning inside a store from a sidewalk in a trip you were already taking. This leads to minimal demand for stores that are very small, or sell cheap items. The smallest you are going to find is the restaurant with a drive-through, which is still quite big. The other issue is that instead of having most prescriptions in blisters, and a quick, automated dispensing system that lets you in an out of the store in seconds, American pharmacies just do way too much work to dispense medicine. Part is insurance and price variation, part regulation, and part just not having everything standardized and in blisters and bottles. So if you go to the pharmacy, you either call in advance, or you are going to sit there for a while. Both of those things are pushing you to sell something more in the pharmacy, so you get a build in convenience store, which is as bad at pricing as any other convenience store. The Spanish pharmacy, where you can get in and out in under a minute, and yet it's often seen as the first layer of the medical system for medical advice, is so much better, but it'd not make any sense given how the US is built, and how we regulate the pharmacy.