TIMES SQUARE WALGREEN'S IS TOURIST TRAP

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TIMES SQUARE GOSSIP HALL OF SHAME

WALGREEN'S WORST IN TIMES SQUARE
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The Times Square Tourist Trap Walgreen's

I have been waiting for another reply from Walgreen's Cooperate office, but after two weeks, I guess Times Square Gossip is being ignored. A few weeks ago, I did what I always do on the weekends, and that's to look at the sales in and around the Times Square Area. I like to shop sales. Why should I pay 10 bucks for something I can get for $4 dollars. So I see these great sales at the Walgreen Times Square store online, and I grab my friend and walk over there to do tons of shopping. I figured these were great sales and even know I always go to CVS because of their great prices, I wanted to give this Walgreen's a try. How disappointed I was. I arrive at the store and I look for the weekly circular. I wanted to have in my hand what was a great buy and shop accordingly. So I look around the store for the circular and there are none. So I figure I'll just look around and the shelves would be marked on any sale Items. I remembered some of the stuff that was on sale, so I went marching down the aisles to look for my deals. Disappointed again. Anything that I remembered as being on sale, there was none of. And some of the items that were supposed to be on sale that they did have, were not marked as a sale item. So I go marching up to the managers desk. I speak to a very nice woman. She tells me none of the shelves are ever marked, if it is on sale it will ring up at the register. She also tells me that they never have the weekly circulars at this Walgreen location. I explain to her, that this is not fair. Every other Walgreen store that I have been to, always have the weekly circulars right at the front door. They also have every sale item marked on the shelves at the other locations and they have the sale items that are advertised most of the time. More importantly, it is New York State law that they have the right prices on the shelves, and I tell her this. She says she is sorry, this is the way it is at this location. I tell her that I get it. Since this Walgreen's store is in Times Square, It is just geared up to be a tourist trap. They do not care about the people that live here, they just want to trap the tourist's. I told her this was so low and I would contact the company.



Times Square Gossip Contacts Walgreen's



So we contact the cooperate offices of Walgreen's. Around a week later, someone calls me from Walgreen's. I explain to the person on the phone that around 100 thousand people live in the Times Square area and that we shop in the stores here and I was very disappointed that their Times Square location seemed to be just a tourist trap with no regard for the people that really live here. I explained in my building alone there are 550 apartments. I said how disappointed I was that their store seemed to be a tourist trap and their company did not care about the people in the neighborhood. I told them that none of the shelves were marked with the prices of the sales, and that they did not have any circulars of any of the sale items. I told the man on the phone, that we could all go right down the street to CVS and do our shopping and get our prescriptions filled and we did not need to shop at a store that did not care about the people that lived there. The Walgreen's spokesperson told me that these were mistakes and that they would be dealt with at the store. He assured me that these problems would be fixed. I told the guy this was only right. Why should the people who live in The Times Square area be treated like this. I told him I would just send my readers and my fellow building neighbors to the CVS store on 42nd and 10th avenue. I also told him I would post notices in our mail room telling everyone not to shop at the Walgreen's in Times Square as well as the Duane Reade stores in and around Times Square, as Walgreen's recently brought that chain. The guy on the phone assured me all corrections would be made and that they were a neighborhood pharmacy and store. He said he was truly sorry.



Walgreen's Lies To Us!



We do not like being lied to by cooperate America. We waited two weeks for them to make the corrections at the store. We went back. No weekly circulars, no shelves marked with the sale items. We asked for the manager. We got this nice guy and he told us they did not have circulars at this location and that they did not mark the sale prices on the shelves. I told him that I had already spoken to the cooperate offices and they said that they were supposed to have the circulars and that the shelves were supposed to be marked with all the correct sale prices. I explained to him that they told me that the corrections would be made. He said sorry, this was a flagship store and they did not do these things. I told him I was from Times Square Gossip and I was going to contact the cooperate offices again and write a story on this Walgreen's being a tourist trap. Right away he knew our website and he went behind the counter and lo and behold he had a weekly circular. He said he was sorry and kept going on and on how this was a flagship store. Some security guard kept adding in his two sense saying flagship store, flagship store.



Flagship Store Ripoff



I looked at them both and said that a flagship store should not only have everything the other stores have, they should be better. It is no excuse that this was their flagship store and not to have the items advertised. I said you have the circulars hidden behind the counter, why do you have them here if you are not going to give them out to your customers. He just continued to go on about this being a flagship store and finally I looked at him and thanked him for the circular and went to shop. So we have our circular that we had to fight so hard for. We start to shop. Considering this is the first day of their supposed sale, every sale item we wanted was out, not stocked. None of the shelves were marked with any of the sale prices even if they did have the item, so I went marching back to the managers counter. The flagship store manager pulled a disappearing act just like the sale prices and the circulars. I asked the security guard where he went, he said the manager was on a break. I told the security guard that none of the sale items were stocked and I wanted to speak to someone. He started to go on and on that this was a flagship store and I just looked at the guy and said I was going on the air in 10 minutes with a radio phone interview and I was going to bring up the fact that Walgreen's was just a tourist trap and could care less about the people that lived here. The guy looked up at me and said have a great show.



We Contact Walgreen's Once Again



We waited over two weeks for another reply from the Walgreen's cooperate offices. We wanted to be fair to them and give them time to fix the problems and to get back to us. No one ever got back to us. No e-mail reply, no phone calls. This tells me one thing. Walgreen's is just one big tourist trap in Times Square and could care less about anyone that lives here. I am posting notices in my mail room sending all our tenants here to CVS. I am telling all the 550 residents in my building to not shop Walgreen's and Duane Reade. When I do radio and television shows, I will once and a while bring up Walgreen's as the worst place in Times Square to shop. I figure if I keep 20 people a day away from their stores that spend 50 bucks a visit, that's a thousand a day lost, 30 thousand dollars a month. With millions of readers on our site and the ones we are syndicated on, I am sure they will lose more customers than this. CVS appreciates the people that live and work in New York City, Walgreen's does not.

Photo By: James Edstrom