Shopping at the Drug Store is Costly
Cited: MSNBC
The next time you drop by CVS, or Walgreen’s, or Rite Aid to have a prescription filled, make sure that’s the only thing you buy. More and more of these popular drug stores are turning into supermarkets with everything on their shelves from toothpaste, shaving cream, and aspirins, to cupcakes, soda, beer, snacks and milk. And while it might be convenient to pick up a few items while you’re waiting for your prescription to be filled, it’ll probably cost you quite a bit more than you might expect to pay for these grocery items.
A new report from Consumer World cautions consumers that grocery items at your local pharmacy can cost as much as 36% more than the same items at the supermarket. In conducting the research for their report Consumer World targeting 25 items found in three supermarkets and three drug stores in a suburban Massachusetts neighborhood. What they found is that at even the most expensive of the three supermarkets, prices there were still 17% cheaper than at the least expensive drug store. The price variations on some of the items was incredible, much more than even the surveyors had expected to find.
The reason for the price gouging at the drug stores is simple, they want to increase their overall profitability by raising prices on front-of-the-store items that people will probably buy out of need, convenience, and impulse. They don’t make any claims to be the best bargain store around when it comes to non-drug or healthcare related items so they can charge whatever the market will allow. The best way to shop at a drug store is like you should shop everywhere else, when they are running specials. More often than not these drug stores will beat supermarket prices for certain products when they run an ad or offer a coupon for purchase of the item, and only then. So stay away from the Ben & Jerry’s while your waiting for your antibiotic at Walgreen’s, unless you have a coupon.
My take:
There’s nothing new here as I’m sure that everyone expects to pay a little more for groceries at a drug store, or even at 7-Eleven for that matter. I never thought the difference in price would be as high as 36% but now that I know, I’ll be a lot more careful about picking up groceries at the drug store.