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Walgreens will permanently close the doors of its 12 San Francisco locations.
Golden City residents will see 12 stores closed by Walgreens stop serving customers at the end of February, the pharmacy chain confirmed Monday.
Addresses of affected stores in San Francisco include 1201 Taraval Street, 3201 Divisadero Street, 1363 Divisadero Street, 825 Market Street, 1750 Noriega Street, 5280 Geary Boulevard, 1524 Polk Street, 1301 Franklin Street, 1189 Potrero Avenue, 135 Powell Street, 1630 Ocean Avenue and 5300 3rd Street, according to Walgreens.
A Walgreens store in Homestead, Florida. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images/File)
He previously reported on the upcoming closures CBS News Bay Area and other local media.
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“It’s never an easy decision to close a store,” Walgreens FOX Business said in a statement. “We know our stores are important to the communities we serve, and that’s why we’re doing everything we can to improve store operations. When closures are necessary, like those here in San Francisco, we’ll work in partnership with community stakeholders to minimize customer disruption.”
The move to close 12 locations was linked to “increased regulatory and reimbursement pressures” that the pharmacy chain said were “straining our ability to cover costs associated with leasing, staffing and supply needs.”
It also said its retail pharmacy business was “a central part of our business strategy going forward”.
Walgreens CEO Tim Wentworth said in October that the company “will focus on stabilizing retail pharmacies by optimizing our footprint, controlling operating costs, improving cash flow and continuing to address the reimbursement model to support dispensing margins and preserve patient access going forward” in the fiscal in 2025
A Walgreens store in Louisville, Ky. (Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg via Getty Images/File)
The pharmacy chain said at the time that efforts to optimize its footprint would include about 1,200 stores closing over a three-year period.
WALGREENS TO CLOSE 1,200 STORES AS PART OF TURNOVER
Walgreens told FOX Business on Monday that the closing 12 stores in San Francisco was part of that initiative.
While discussing the company’s first-quarter earnings late last week, Wentworth told analysts and investors that Walgreens “has begun our footprint optimization program and is pleased with the initial results.”
“We are currently exceeding historical script retention rates and have retained most store and pharmacy team members,” he also said. “We expect to significantly accelerate the pace of our store closings from first quarter levels.”
(Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg via Getty Images/File)
The company said its store closing target for fiscal 2025 was 500 locations.
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Wentworth said Walgreens “expects[s] our future footprint to support better performance.”
Walgreens reported that it works about 8,500 retail pharmacy locations in the US at the end of November.
