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Look at the fliers you get in your weekly mail -- almost all of them are for either supermarkets or drugstores. Those places are fiercely competitive, very sale-oriented, and go on the thinnest of profit margins. For example, one of my local markets, which had been high-end when it came to prices, now has big signs up outside and on every aisle proclaiming their dedication to bargains. But how long can they survive that way?
And at least from my own experience, drugstores like Eckert have an additional problem. They're big enough to be hard to find things, but not big enough to have a very interesting selection of items. What they do have tends to be crap -- cheap sandals and tacky knick-knacks. They're short of clerks, and those they have don't know the stock very well. And when it comes to prescriptions, the prices are higher and the waiting time longer than the local independent pharmacy that sells nothing but drugs.
Drugstores might do better if they slimmed down a bit -- limited themselves to prescriptions, over-the-counter medications, vitamins, toiletries, and cosmetics -- and left the housewares and such aside. But they'll still be in a high-competititon market, and probably at the mercy of places like Walmart.
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