Walgreens 24 hour pharmacy saved a vacation one year.

walgreens is better i hate duane reade

Whenever I shop in DR here, I always wish it were a Walgreens.

Maybe now we'll have some 'real' sales and the sale items will be stocked.

It may not happen today, tomorrow, or the next day, but eventually all the DR stores will be named Walgreen.

I would hope Walgreens changes the name and everything. 24hrs is a really cool thing, but the franchise owners might not agree to it.

I really like Walgreens because of the 1 hour photo, but going to the Blvd each time isn't fun. Would be nice if they added one here.

I've got a Duane Reade next door (Newport.) It is pretty useless and any change will be for the better. Actually demolition would be better.

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I agree. Walgreens >>>> Duane Reade.
DR at Grove Pointey closes so damn early and everything is marked up to high heaven (a problem at all DR locations).

I heard Whole Foods might be buying Walgreens.

Might see some form of co-branding such as : "Duane Reade...a Walgreens Partner." Ultimately the goal will be to have loyal Walgreens shoppers also shop at Duane Reade AND to have loyal Duane Reade shoppers do business at Walgreens. The front store is an after thought for many of these locations. The real money is behind the prescription counter where they realize large profit margins. One medication for a family member was 48 dollars at Duane Reade recently and under 12 dollars at Target. (Duane Reade in the past has matched Target pricing on prescriptions which can save some of you out there real money.) Consumer Reports thinks Costco is the best place to buy prescription medication because they take only minimum mark-ups above their cost.

Most likely as they said in New York City they won't change the name, other places it is less know so probably they are more likely, and they sell everything and anything . Even if they don't change the name they will have the Walgreen own products to help for when they would in time. The buy gives them that much more volume to the business they already have. The higher the volume, the cheaper things become to make a profit. Walmart classic example or Target. I grew up in the midwest when it was Daytons who thought lets have a store to sell everything we can't get rid of, and now Daytons, the same family as the only individual to that fortune was also a Senator, Mark Dayton, kind of similiar to Corzine run in NJ, except every more difference between the rival in amount of cash on hand, than fun raised. And well it was split and Target was becoming much more profitable. And soon all Daytons were magically overnight Macy's, since Macy's was only in Chicago and Maybe 1 or 2 other cities in the Midwest while Daytons any City over say 40,000 or so had one so a great way to gain market share in an area, and Walgreens will leave as for 5 or 10 years and magically over night the same will happen most likely, just as Macy's did in the Midwest.

Everything I've read suggests that Walgreens won't be rebranding any of the Duane Reades anytime soon. If they do it will be years down the road.

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Where did you see this? I am pretty sure that Walgreen will be converting these stores to their own brand.

Two Walgreen's that I know of are both on the Boulevard: one at Communipaw and one at Seaview.

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God I hope not! Walgreens tend to be 24 hours and full of the most random useful things.

Fortunately, Duane Reade will continue to operate as a stand-alone business.

Another New York City sell out: Walgreen Co. buys Duane Reade for just over $1 billion

BY CHRISTINA BOYLE AND CORKY SIEMASZKO
DAILY NEWS

Walgreens may soon own the corner drugstore, but it will always be a Duane Reade to real New Yorkers.

That was the reaction from many shoppers Wednesday amid reports the city's fifth-biggest chain was being gobbled up by Chicago-area giant Walgreens in a billion-dollar deal.

"It's very important that Duane Reade keeps its name because Duane Reade is New York City," said Rene Wright, 53, of East Flatbush, Brooklyn. "I know where every Duane Reade is from here to Ground Zero."

Duane Reade got its name from the two downtown streets - Duane and Reade - where the company opened the first of its citywide 257 stores in 1960.

Shoppers at the flagship store said it should stay a Duane Reade - no matter who owns it.

"All these years we've only known it as Duane Reade," said Bibi Khan, 57, of South Ozone Park, Queens. "I feel loyal to Duane Reade."

Walgreens said it has no immediate plan to rename the New York area stores it is buying. And, under the terms of a deal that needs regulatory approval, Duane Reade's top bosses get to keep their jobs - for now.

That was good enough for 56-year-old Carmen Rodriguez of the Bronx.

"It's sad to think that Duane Reade won't exist, but if they're not changing the name then it's not such a big deal," she said.

More budget-minded shoppers put sentiment aside and said that if the extinction of New York's homegrown pharmacy chain means lower prices - they're for it.

"I shop wherever is cheapest," said student Robert Castro, 24, of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. "Maybe it will bring the prices down, which would be a good thing."

Walgreens, which has 70 drugstores in the city and suburbs, will soon operate 7,162 pharmacies across the U.S., making it the nation's largest drugstore chain. By eliminating Duane Reade, Walgreens' biggest competitors in New York are Rite Aid and CVS.

Duane Reade's sales totaled about $1.8 billion in 2009 but the chain was riddled with debt.

cboyle@nydailynews.com

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/money/2010 ... 1_bill.html#ixzz0gOIUTJdw