Porter Square Walgreens closing

[keithn.livejournal.com]

While not Davis Square, this is still likely of interest since I'm sure many of us are regularly in Porter Square - the Walgreens there is closing on July 30.

It will probably be a shock to few that this store failed, although I'm somewhat surprised that it failed so quickly.

Comments

[misterthorn.livejournal.com]

Between the curse that hangs over that building, and opening up right across the street from a larger competitor, I'm surprised it stayed open as long as it did.

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

Larger? I think it's bigger than the CVS. Crappier service the few times I tried, though.

[misterthorn.livejournal.com]

You're right. I just meant larger as a corporation, and therefore probably able to negotiate things at a scale Walgreen's wouldn't be able to. Now that I actually Google it though, it looks like Walgreen's is bigger in some ways (number of stores), and CVS is bigger in others (sales). *shrug*

[ron_newman]

This opened in August 2013, so it didn't even quite get to the 2-year mark.

The store seemed more pleasant than CVS across the street, but I never saw anyone in it. They were 24-hour for a while, but that didn't last. When it opened, I questioned their decision to devote so much floor space to food, with a 24-hour Shaw's/Star right across the street.

[hahathor.livejournal.com]

That's a shame. I didn't make it there often, being so close to the Davis CVS, but in Porter I'd go to Walgreens over CVS every time.

[gentlescholar.livejournal.com]

I was driven out by the bad lighting--it was almost painful to go in there, at least in the early days.
And yes, trying to be a food store across from a Star Market and a drugstore across from a CVS and a phone store (because phone stores always do so well--not), I just walked around the place, thinking, "You are doing everything badly, instead of picking something to be good at."

[ckd]

Yup. I went in there once looking for cough drops and they had such a poor selection that I left empty-handed.

Cough drops.

[tsuki-no-bara.livejournal.com]

i had that problem too - it wasn't cough drops, but whatever i was looking for, the selection was better at cvs. the walgreen's always looked weirdly empty, stock-wise, like there was too much floor space for the shelves they had.

[keithn.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to know that I'm not the only person who hated the lighting in there. The whole place had a prison vibe to it. Harsh lighting, security monitors and cameras everywhere, a security guard roaming around, alarms going off when the side door was opened (they did eventually fix the door alarm).

I also found that I _always_ had to wait a long time to checkout. The few shoppers in the store were always in line. If there was no line, nobody would be at the registers and you'd have to wait for someone to come over.

I know some people hate self checkout, but when you are only buying a few items and you want privacy - which is frequently the case at a pharmacy - self checkout is great, IMO. I've never had a problem at the CVS across the street.

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

I wasn't in there much, but I remember thinking it was spilling far too much light out at night.

And yeah, lines.

I note that Shaw's dropped their self-checkout when they got bought by Star, so I'm guessing there's a "more trouble than it's worth" factor. So much for the impending automation apocalypse.

[siderea]

Other way around: was Star, then was bought by Shaw's. My recollection is that the self-checkout was a thing tried by Shaws (the new owners) and then subsequently discarded; have I misremembered? I seem to recall a bunch of changes happening all about the time the new manager, er, "Store Director", Kevin Bacon, came in, such as the switch from pop to classical[*] music on the sound system.

I don't know why Shaw's dropped it; I can think of a bunch of potential reason including that People's Republic of Cambridge residents saw the self-checkout as taking jobs away from the community, and the additional cost of paying wages was worth it in PR for Shaws. Certainly Stop and Shop in Arlington (and through the whole chain?) has decided that self-checkout is worth the hassle, so it's curious.

[* And baroque. Do they do that in all Star/Shaw's? Or just ones in Cambridge?]

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Wiki says Shaw's bought Star in 1999, and now I recall my customer card working at both Porter Shaw's and Beacon st. Star a few years ago. But at some points they rebranded Porter to Star, and dropped the cards, and dropped the Porter self-checkout (Beacon never had it.)

I thought I was told the card-drop was related to some ownership change, but dunno.

I've only been to those two and haven't noticed the music much. Beacon's in Somerville, of course.

[londo.livejournal.com]

The Porter store is one of the froofier stores that chain has. One of the top-grossing stores nationally for cheese sales, especially - #3, I think?

And classical music means expensive, right?

[ron_newman]

I believe that Star and Shaw's dropped self-checkout chain-wide, not just here in Cambridge.

I've never thought self-checkout made much sense when you have to deal with produce.

[kelkyag]

A surprising amount of produce is bar-coded these days (my last pineapple came with a tag with cutting instructions and a QR code), and a fair bit of the rest has the PLU number on it on a sticker or twist-tie or similar. I only have to look up about a quarter of my produce by name at the self-checkout most of the time.

[paradoox.livejournal.com]

I was told by the manager of the Star at Brighton Landing (or whatever it is called) that Star decided to get rid of all self-checkout. I can hope this was for customer service reasons, but, ISTM, that self-checkout is a great opportunity for fraud esp with produce and I wonder if their "loss prevention" people drove this change.

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how not having the self checkout leads to better customer service. You have the choice to use it or not if you don't like it. I personally prefer it as I get tired of having to stop them for bagging things and convincing them no really I don't want a bag please. Their training just simply doesn't include people who don't want to waste bags.

[ron_newman]

Any time I go to a supermarket and hand them my own cloth or canvas bags, they are happy to fill them.

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

Great, but if you just want to carry something out in your hands, they look at you like you have 3 heads.

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

There are just too many problems with self-checkout when you have so many different items. They wouldn't take Star/Shaw gift cards, coupons wouldn't scan or the box would get full, it would accidentally catch another card on your massive key chain of shopper cards, no one available to reset machines, items too heavy or too light for the belt... You absolutely need dedicated staff on the machines because there are just too many variables that can cause problems.

[rhi-chan.livejournal.com]

I've talked to people about this/ have paid way too much attention to the Star Market brand since I was a kid...
Shaw's was bought out about two years ago by a Canadian company who wanted to do away with loyalty cards, feeling that they should be able to offer lower prices to ALL customers, not just a special few. There was a deal for a bit where if you turned one in, you got a coupon for a free soda or something.
The company then felt that it should go back to its Boston roots, and slowly rebranded all Shaw's back to Star Market, starting with the one in Allston at Packard's Corner.
Self check out was done away with at the Porter location in favour of a stronger focus on customer service, but they continue to exist in other locations.

[ron_newman]

And yet for some reason the one in East Boston remains a Shaw's.

[siderea]

Shaw's was bought out about two years ago by a Canadian company who wanted to do away with loyalty cards, feeling that they should be able to offer lower prices to ALL customers, not just a special few.

I approve of not needing "loyalty" cards to get discounts, but I really, really, really wish I could just swipe a card to get Star to email me my receipt instead of having to manually type in a phone number. Eventually I'm going to mistype it (how often do I dial my own phone??) and manage to hit some other random MyMixx member's account, and they're going to get emailed my receipt and hilarity will ensue.

[teko.livejournal.com]

I hated going in there for exactly this reason. The intensely harsh lighting and the huge windows made me feel like all of Porter Square was watching me buy Metamucil.

And yes, every time I went in there, the line was bizarrely slow, even with only one or two people in line.

Combine those with a lousy parking situation and way too much floor space dedicated to food and Boston souvenirs, and I didn't expect the place to last, sadly.

[londo.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I found the lighting in there physically painful, which I don't think I've ever experienced in a retail store before.

[rmd.livejournal.com]

I found the lighting disconcerting, but it's always struck me as too big a space for what it was, so I'm not surprised it was not sustainable.

[paradoox.livejournal.com]

I was never in the Walgreen's in Porter that I can recall but I would point out that Walgreen's is often cheaper than CVS. So, I am kind of surprised it failed.

[ron_newman]

Almost everything I buy at CVS ends up being heavily discounted by their loyalty card and various coupons that come with the card. (For example, I just bought two 10-ounce spraycans of 70 SPF sunscreen for $4.48 total, after applying three coupons.) Does Walgreens have a comparable program?

[paradoox.livejournal.com]

Yes, but it doesn't work as well as the CVS Program. On the other hand "generic" Psuedophed is usually 50% more at CVS (about 18.00 at CVS vs. about 12.00 at Walgreens for 96).

[ron_newman]

Next time you need this, if the hours work for you, try Harvard Vanguard pharmacy. They often have very cheap generic over-the-counter drugs.

[myselftheliar.livejournal.com]

Aw that's sad, I preferred it to the CVS.

[starkyld.livejournal.com]

They have (had?) an amazing cosmetics selection for a chain pharmacy. Can anyone confirm whether their existing cosmetics stock is currently super-discounted in advance of closing?

[ron_newman]

I didn't look specifically at cosmetics, but they didn't seem to be having any kind of store-wide clearance sale when I dropped by there yesterday. Maybe when it gets closer to the closing date?

[somergirl80.livejournal.com]

I went in their recently and all of the bigger lines like "The Balm" we're gone aside from store testers. Not sure if they ever went on sale or if they sent stock to other stores or if employees bought them out.

They do have some essie polishes for $2.12.