Rite Aid maybe closing up to 117 stores

[BabyBlissProducts]

Rite Aid maybe closing up to 117 stores.

Large writedown almost doubles Rite Aid 4Q loss



NEW YORK -- After Rite Aid Corp.'s loss doubled in the the fiscal fourth quarter, the drugstore operator is planning to shut down as many as 117 stores over the next year as it tries to cut costs.
The Camp Hill, Pa., company said the closings will be scattered around the country, targeting stores with weak sales and those that are close to another Rite Aid. Saddled with debt and acquired stores that are not living up to expectations, Rite Aid is working to cut inventory and expenses.
Rite Aid said its fourth-quarter results were hurt by the recession, along with a fairly mild cough, cough and flu season and the introduction of new low-cost generic drugs.






About 70 of the stores slated for closure used to be part of the Brooks Eckerd chain. Rite Aid bought 1,850 of those stores in June 2007 for $2.36 billion, but they have not done as well as Rite Aid's older stores, a trend continued in March.
Rite Aid had 4,901 stores in 31 states at the end of February, and the moves will leave it with about 2,000 stores less than rivals CVS Caremark Corp. and Walgreen Co. The retailer plans 20 store openings and 55 relocations in fiscal 2010, which ends next Feb. 28.
Rite Aid closed 200 stores in fiscal 2008, cutting its store count by 158.
The company plans to eliminate 67 stores by the end of May, including 12 stores that were recently sold to Walgreen. Rite Aid also said it will close a distribution center in Newnan, Ga. It has announced two distribution center closings this year, cutting about 360 jobs at an estimated savings of $4.9 million a year.
Rite Aid acquired the distribution centers as part of the Brooks Eckerd purchase.
In the fiscal fourth quarter, Rite Aid reported a loss attributable to common stockholders of $2.3 billion, or $2.67 per share. It lost $960.4 million, or $1.20 per share, a year ago. Because of the plunging value of Rite Aid stock, the company wrote down the value of its assets by $1.81 billion. About $1.2 billion of that expense came from writing down the value of the Brooks Eckerd stores.
Chairman and Chief Executive Mary Sammons said the $1.2 billion write-down of the former Brooks Eckerd stores "is not a true reflection of the long-term benefit we expect to see from our acquired stores." On the company conference call, she added that the newer stores have not met Rite Aid's original expectations, but pharmacy results are improving.
Rite Aid shares have been trading under $1 since September and closed at 39 cents on Wednesday. The company plans to boost its share price later this year with a reverse stock split.
Rite Aid shares rose 6 cents, or 15.4 percent, to close at 45 cents Thursday. They set an all-time low of 20 cents last month.
Excluding the write-downs and a number of other one-time costs, Rite Aid lost $116.9 million, or 14 cents per share. Revenue fell 2 percent, to $6.71 billion, in part because of the reduced store count.
Thomson Reuters says analysts expected a smaller loss of 11 cents per share and $6.71 billion in revenue.
Rite Aid's fiscal 2010 forecast was mostly below analyst estimates. The company said it expects to lose $210 million to $435 million for the year, or between 26 cents and 53 cents per share. It called for $26.3 billion to $26.7 billion in revenue, and said same-store sales would rise 0.5 to 2.5 percent.
Analysts expected a loss of 36 cents per share on $26.68 billion in revenue.
In fiscal 2009, Rite Aid reported a loss of $2.94 billion, or $3.49 per share, compared with $1.11 billion, or $1.54 per share in fiscal 2008. Its revenue rose 8 percent, to $26.29 billion from $24.33 billion.
In a note to clients, Standard & Poor's analyst Joseph Agnese said Rite Aid's poor financial condition creates a lot of risk, although sales are slowly improving and the company is making progress at reducing costs.
The Herald Online (http://www.heraldonline.com/426/story/1242389.html)

[dealskillme]

It is sad. I like my riteaid. I usually goto the one in Apex, NC on highway 55. But yesterday I had severe migraine, found out I was out of imitrex and wanted my prescription transferred from Kmart to riteaid here on tryon rd. When I requested for the refill, the pharmacist was so rude, talked as if they are doing a favour to me by transferring. I was like ok thank you I dont want any prescription to be filled from this store even in my dream. Just came out of the store, called my doctor, spoke to her. She said she will give physicians sample to me immediately as she knows I can pass out if I dont control. I kick myself for using all the tablets last month(blame on the rain we had which triggers me headache). How can they be so rude? The store itself is in a pathetic stage as there are cvs and walgreens and harristeer pharmacy compete for everything.

[sindy9002]

It's a bad news. That's means many people will lose their job.

[rcbrad]

Since Rite aid is in severe trouble, you would think that the employees would bend over backwards to earn and keep our business! People who are rude or have poor attitudes for no reason do not belong in dealing with the public at all.

[mommycia]

It is sad. I LOVE my riteaid...just wish the deals were better lately. There are 2 checkers that I always use, and they are both sweethearts. 1 even noticed that someone else had used a higher value coupon than I had and pointed it out, it was in the insert that I hadnt cut up yet :)

[kimandkathess]

What is wrong here??? CVS has cut back on the decent ecb deals, Walgreens is losing their rebate/ivc coupon program, and now riteaid wants to close stores??? This really stinks big time!!

~~Katrina~~

[kimandkathess]

What is wrong here??? :hectic1:CVS has cut back on the decent ecb deals, Walgreens is losing their rebate/ivc coupon program, and now riteaid wants to close stores??? This really stinks big time!!

~~Katrina~~

[kimandkathess]

ooops....posted twice.

[cpaige]

I have 2 RA's within 1/4 mile of each other, as they bought out another store and opened newer one. With that being done, I'm not surprised that this is happening.

[Gransonec]

I like my local store and hope it's not on the chopping block. But, it is in a shopping center where the anchor store (Winn-Dixie) closed. Nothing else is in the shopping center except for some kind of health care thing and possibly a chinese restaurant, if it's still open. Even the McDonald's at the front of the shopping center has rebuilt itself - across the street. There are only 2 locations within a 20 or 30 mile drive of here. Hopefully, they decide to keep one open and it's mine. I've been shopping that store, since I was in elementary and it was a K&B Drugs location. The other one is in a poorer area, got robbed with 3 or 4 shooting victims last year and seems to be surviving on the sale of alcohol and cigarettes. Come to think of it, it's in a dead shopping center also. Hopefully, them not us.

[purplefdu]

I have 2 RA's within 1/4 mile of each other, as they bought out another store and opened newer one. With that being done, I'm not surprised that this is happening.
We used to have 4 in a one mile radius. Two across from each other for four months when they built a new one when the property came available and they built then did studies to decide which to keep and which to close. We now have three in that area. Next big town over has ONE brand new huge store. I never figured they could keep going with such random decisions on how many stores and where they put them. Even walmart has a plan. Every 20 miles, lol.

[sbp]

I have 2 RA's within 1/4 mile of each other, as they bought out another store and opened newer one. With that being done, I'm not surprised that this is happening.


I agree!!! I knew it was bound to happen in the areas where they bought out a Brooks store fairly closeby to an existing RA store. Hopefully they'll be able to transfer some of their employees over to another store, instead of just letting them go.

I know it doesn't compare in numbers, but they are planning on opening 20 new stores. Companies are always closing low revenue producing stores at the same time that they are planning on opening new stores in different areas.

[flopcat]

Sad, very sad. Hope the company does better soon.

They had too many stores in my area. All of them used to be Eckerd. They closed one. Hope they don't close the one close to my house. The pharmacy techs are actually nice there.

To the person who was treated rudely, sorry to hear it. I agree that if the company is doing so bad, they should try harder to be nice for that reason alone, if they can't just be nice for the sake of being nice.

[Ilovemyboys]

The Rite Aid in the town next to me is closing in south carolina. It is on a pretty busy road to but it is across from a Walgreens and down the street from a CVS.

[nikarphar]

It is sad. I like my riteaid. I usually goto the one in Apex, NC on highway 55. But yesterday I had severe migraine, found out I was out of imitrex and wanted my prescription transferred from Kmart to riteaid here on tryon rd. When I requested for the refill, the pharmacist was so rude, talked as if they are doing a favour to me by transferring. I was like ok thank you I dont want any prescription to be filled from this store even in my dream. Just came out of the store, called my doctor, spoke to her. She said she will give physicians sample to me immediately as she knows I can pass out if I dont control. I kick myself for using all the tablets last month(blame on the rain we had which triggers me headache). How can they be so rude? The store itself is in a pathetic stage as there are cvs and walgreens and harristeer pharmacy compete for everything.


Oh MY GOd !!
That sounds EXACTLY something that I would post !! I 've had the same experience at this store !! They are AWFUL !

[clippyclippy]

Oh MY GOd !!
That sounds EXACTLY something that I would post !! I 've had the same experience at this store !! They are AWFUL !
I went into this store last week for the first time in a long time (I used to like it, never had trouble - one of the Pharmacy Assistants goes to my church).
The guy checking me out told me my coupons (Shick) said "one per purchase" and he would only accept one.
I tried to educate him on the purchase vs. transaction, but he wouldn't budge. I just told him I'd go to another RA, and I did.
He is the only one in my couponing experience to pull that one on me.

[anaj06]

They are just finishing building one across the street from me....I guess it is not on the chopping block? They just put the lettering on the outside.

[JOURDYSMOM]

When RA bought out Eckerds, they had like 7 within 2 miles here ( Compared To 1 Wags and ZERO CVS) they are down to 3, all the others have closed :(

[lovelace]

They all ready close one in mbsc last month.

[cheapcheap]

I'm now down to one Rite Aid. The one closest to my bank just closed beginning of this year. The other one has great, friendly employees that are very helpful, but the store is almost always empty. Keeping my fingers crossed that they stay open!

[bmoncher]

One o four local riteaids closed on friday... Still have several within 5 miles tho

[wealthybarney]

January 2009 CNN Money stated several businesses that were so in the red, that they would go bankrupt sometime this year.
Rite-Aid was one of the many.

[Lmnde]

Ours is closed for a couple of days [for inventory I guess] and is reopening for a 50% clearance sale starting this coming Saturday. It doesn't look like the clearance sales will be handled as regular store sales but may be possibly outsourced to a different company [not sure of that, but the signs on the door were kind of odd]. In that case - do you guys think they'll accept coupons??? Has anybody else gone to any of the clearance sales when your stores closed??? Were you able to use coupons?

[scottzbabiedoll]

I am kinda uneasy about the Rite Aids closing :( I just got my job there about a month ago and have heard plenty of talk about it. Where I am at we are in competition with two other Rite Aids in a hour radius and one or two of those will be closing sometime this year or so... :(

[cheapcheap]

Ours is closed for a couple of days [for inventory I guess] and is reopening for a 50% clearance sale starting this coming Saturday. It doesn't look like the clearance sales will be handled as regular store sales but may be possibly outsourced to a different company [not sure of that, but the signs on the door were kind of odd]. In that case - do you guys think they'll accept coupons??? Has anybody else gone to any of the clearance sales when your stores closed??? Were you able to use coupons?

When my local store had their closeout sale, no coupons were accepted. I think all the good stuff gets shipped out to other locations. The rest tends to be knicknacks.

[momtoemryab]

well, my husband works for rite aid, so we're screwed if they close stores here. all the stores in this part of the state (8 or so) were former brooks locations and there were no rite aids within 2 hours of here prior. his store does ok, but not great. the problem with it is that if other stores nearby close, it won't make sense to keep his open as it will be far away for deliveries.
just an aside...having worked retail, it's not a job a lot of people choose or enjoy. clerks should still be polite, but it might be hard if they don't like their jobs or if they are worried about their store closing. i don't let rude clerks bother me -- they are probably just unhappy.

[sweetdeals]

I love my riteaid and am rooting for them trying to give them more of my business too.

[tn20]

We have 2 Rite Aids in town (which is kind of odd, because we only have 1 Kmart, 1 Walmart, 1 Walgreens, and basically no other stores), so I'll be suprised if 1 of them doesn't close.

For the most part, I like Rite Aid. I like the SCR program. But it seems like its getting harder and harder to go there. The items are hard to find... a lot of the time sale items aren't tagged, or old tags are up. I don't really know what to expect because rules are frequently changing. Then, I was at 1 Rite Aid at opening Sun. to get SCR items. There were a bunch of the FAR wart remover, only 2 tubes of FAR toothpaste, and no foot stuff. I had my purchased figured out to use my $5/$25 Q, so not having the foot stuff threw me off. So, I went to the other store and they had the foot stuff, but nothing else. So I go back to the first Rite Aid (they are a LOT more helpful!) and ask the manager, who checks their inventory and said they were not shipped any of the foot stuff and she didn't know if they would be getting any. WHY would they not get ANY of a rebate item in??? Especially when the other local store got a bunch in, but didn't get the other stuff?!? Annoying! I felt like they were conspiring against me to keep me from using my $5/$25 Q! :)

So anyway, I hope Rite Aid can stay open, but I think they need to get it together and really make an effort to stay afloat. It seems like they keep going downhill instead of giving it their all to keep the business going. And this could just be my local Rite Aids, where many of their employees are teenagers who seem to hate their jobs.

[momtoemryab]

i'm nervous today. lots of corporate people are traveling in the northeast this week...the rumor in the stores is that they are "handing out pink slips".
my husband has been working 16 hour days all summer -- i think he knows something he's not telling me...

[anothershopper2]

It's tough call for me... the one closest to me seems to have workers that want the store close down. They are not friendly and don't even make any effort to keep the customers in the store. I have 4 other drug stores in the area... at least make an effort - sheesh! I heard that they restructured their debt so I shopped there for the first time this year. I spent good money OOP - and they still fought me on 2 cpns that were perfectly legitimate and nothing remotely could have been questioned. My OOP was still $28 (very high for HCWer). B/c of that - I am transferring DD's prescription to another drug store. The store manager tried to tell me that I was stupid and couldn't do simple math (while he was the one who could not). He tried to tell me that I was getting something for free with the cpns which was ridiculous since I only had 5 items and paid $28 oop and nothing was free - seriously. Seemed like a really ridiculous battle for him to pick with me. It was $3/1 Huggies cpn... for $11.49 packages of diapers... no idea what was going through his head.

[momtoemryab]

i'm not saying it's ok to be rude to customers, but customers have to realize that these people are worried about their company going bankrupt and they get people complaining all day about prices and stock problems (things that aretotlally out of the individual store's control). then they see couponers (and i'm one of them) getting deals and (wrongly) view them as cutting into profits.
again...not saying it's ok to be rude and argue with customers, but i know 5 people who lost their jobs yesterday and there's a good chance my husband could lose his at any time. there's not a lot of other places hiring retail managers these days -- these managers and store staff are stressed out.
on a side note -- i don't argue about coupons, even if i'm right. i just don't buy the item and go do the deal at another store.

[amanzo01]

The problem I have with just walking away when cashiers question my coupons is it makes me look like I was doing something wrong. I want the cashier to know that I'm using the coupons legitimately.

[ritaillinois]

I'm seeing changes in our local Rite Aids. $3.99 for a goofy box of Nature Valley Granola Bars...the 6 pack! Also, they no longer put the "Free" tags on the rebate items that are free after rebate. The employees don't look happy anymore at the one that is closest to where I live. A new manager has been brought in. Not good signs.

[clippyclippy]

I was really surprised to find out tonight that my RA is only restocking every 2 weeks now. They used to restock every Thursday and now it is every other Thursday.
Sad thing was, even though today was the day they restocked, they were out of half the stuff I needed.

[scottzbabiedoll]

Yeah, we were to stocking every 2 weeks instead of weekly... about a month ago.

I was really surprised to find out tonight that my RA is only restocking every 2 weeks now. They used to restock every Thursday and now it is every other Thursday.
Sad thing was, even though today was the day they restocked, they were out of half the stuff I needed.

[knecht531]

I'm in northeast pa and I have 2 RA stores close by. One of them is building a brand new store and the other one has really good staff. The stuff that isn't on sale is $$$, the stock isn't the best, but I did get $28 worth of stuff today for $6 with no problems with my coupons. I hope they aren't closing down, I like my RAs!

[Kulis]

Yesterday I drove past a Rite Aid with signs in the windows announcing the store was closing and everything is now 50% off. Will they still accept coupons?

[knecht531]

When Eckerd was closing they still accepted coupons. but I'm not sure about Rite Aid.

I guess I didn't really answer your question huh?:wink7:

[csdickerson531]

When our RA closed, the sign on the door said they would no longer accept q's.