WALGREENS

MINNEAPOLIS — Despite an overall decrease in free standing insert coupon activity, retailer promotion pages within the FSI vehicles recorded a 30.7% increase to more than 17 billion pages in 2011, continuing the significant annual increases in retailer promotion activity, which began in 2007, Kantar Media reported Wednesday.

Overall, the number of free-standing insert coupons distributed through 2011 dropped 6.5% compared with 2010. This decline in FSI coupon activity followed two consecutive years of annual increases of 8% in 2009 and 7.2% in 2010.

SUNBURY, Pa. — Weis Markets on Tuesday named Joseph Douglas the grocer's VP pharmacy.

Douglas will oversee the day-to-day merchandising, operation and management of Weis Markets’ 122 pharmacies and also will direct the company’s lifestyle initiatives’ team, which focuses on health-and-wellness issues. Douglas will report to Kurt Schertle, SVP sales and merchandising.

Douglas was a 27-year Walgreens veteran, where he was VP transforming community practice.

DEERFIELD, Ill. — Walgreens on Friday unveiled a plan to help Express Scripts patients to either continue using Walgreens when possible or to make a smooth transition to another community pharmacy. The plan seeks to minimize patient disruption and inconvenience, the pharmacy operator stated.

The role of the pharmacist has evolved considerably over the past decade, and few things exemplify that evolution more than pharmacists taking an active role in patients’ medication therapies and consulting with them one-on-one.


NEW YORK — Duane Reade continues to raise the bar and reshape how consumers shop consumables at drug stores with its revamped 24-hour location at 52nd Street and Broadway in New York.


To better reflect the needs of the neighborhood, which is brimming largely with tourists and business travelers, Duane Reade transformed the former 3,100-sq.-ft. Duane Reade Express store into a 20,000-sq.-ft. health, beauty and daily living destination.


NEW YORK — Retailers will report weak December front-end sales growth across the drug channel as continued inflation likely was offset by the slow start to the flu season and disappointing overall traffic and volume growth, Credit Suisse research analyst Ed Kelly suggested in a note published Tuesday.

"While drug stores have been fairly successful passing through product cost inflation at the shelf, our Nielsen Trend Tracker shows that volumes have decelerated in recent months given the weak consumer and normal price elasticity," he wrote.

Rather than take off for Christmas, the editors of Drug Store News took a look at the year ahead and the stories, issues and trends that will make headlines in retail pharmacy in 2012.

DEERFIELD, Ill. — Washington, D.C., mayor Vincent Gray on Friday will join Walgreens executives when the national drug store chain unveils its new health and daily living store to residents of Washington, D.C., during a ribbon cutting celebration starting at 11 a.m.