Eckerd Drugs - Life in America 

It's the best.

Years ago I stayed in Pompano with my aunt & uncle. Great time.

I loved the contrast between the old stores selling tobacco and more recent selling Nicorette.

Rite-AId sells cigarettes and CVS does not, As a smoker, I need to keep track of these things, LOL. I get where CVS is coming from, Smoking is NOT healthy. But I also get where Rite-Aid is coming from, Nicotine IS a drug. LOL.

In my small town we have 3 stand alone drug stores and we have a Walgreens and Cvs of course Walmart. Back in the 80s Cvs bought out Revco in our town.

@@roscoeshepard In our town it was the 90s.

By 1997 Cvs bought the remaining Revco stores.

My husband and I (then boyfriend) worked at Revco while we were in college. Most fun job I have ever had. I loved it. The pharmacists were our bosses and were wonderful. It was just an old school store with pharmacy. It was bought by CVS and the cool old building was torn down. 😞

God Bless you and her🙏

Sry for your loss. I can relate.

I have heard Thrifty’s before. And Rexall Drugs in Texas now gone.

@@rbsmith3365 Many things are gone. I'm still here.

@@photonotavailable7936 Yeah! Jobs are gone and businesses moved to online too. What’s next? CVS takes over our grocery stores and charge us double? I’ll die!

JC Penney split Eckerd up, with stores in the northern states going to Jean Coutu (Canadian company who subsequently sold them to Rite Aid) and the southern states' stores going to CVS.

It's true. When I first moved here 25 years ago I used a local pharmacy in the same town as my doctor. He wound up selling & CVS took over. I moved to the pharmacy connected to my supermarket. Still there.

totally agree. and Walgreens with their plastic crap.

@James Doolittle So prescriptions at Costco are not a side business? LOL.

My dad had an independent pharmacy that was pretty much killed off by the big chains. His suppliers couldn’t sell him a lot of things that he could buy cheaper at a chain drugstore or Kmart. We’re starting to see a return of independents in the Philadelphia region. Of course, when it comes to prescription services, even the biggest drug store Chains are suffering due to mail order prescription services. It’s funny that he said that Eckerd made most of his money back in the day on prescription services. Seems to me that Eckerd flip that. They made the pharmacy counter is pretty much an appendage to what is really a convenience store.

The supermarket chains want to do that here 🇦🇺 But our pharmacy peak is one of the most powerful in the country. They have held the supermarkets off and regularly try to take functions away from GPs like vaccinations and minor sick certificates. Leading to rows with doctors’ associations. But while some pharmacies (‘chemists’) have a gift shop feel, they never sold tobacco or offered a diner or milk bar counter like in the US.

I go to an Eckerd drug store, but it is a Rite Aid now.

I am in the Houston area as well, and live right around the corner from a former Eckerd which currently houses an Advance Auto Parts store. It didn't become CVS due to 2 existing, newer CVS stores operating nearby.

Mount Vernon this weekend after Church, Jesus Resurrection Day, we are taking camper to lb. Grasslands in Decatur, like to stop at Race Trac gas station there

Did they have any black employees?

@@dwightpowell6673 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂🤔😅😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

Longs Drugs here on the West Coast was bought out by CVS.

A great chunk of the CVS stores in Texas and Florida were once Eckerd stores.

I never knew HEB even had a photo department, and I've been shopping there since I was a kid.

I always thought Eckerds was a Southern chain as well since I never remembered seeing them outside of Florida when I was younger.

@@retnavybrat Their second biggest market was Texas. Many of them were sold to CVS, while others in northern states were sold to Jean Coutu (a Canadian company who sold them to Rite Aid not long after).

There is both Rite Aid and Walgreens within a 5-minute walking distance from my house, and two CVS within a mile.

Rite Aid is from Camp Hill Pennsylvania and its all over the state of Pennsylvania and more. And CVS and Walgreens is too expensive.

@@rbsmith3365 There are not many Rite Aids here in Virginia were I live. CVS stands for Consumer Value Store, but they are not value as they are expensive. You can the same thing at Walmart cheaper

@@davinp Hi Davin, Consumer Value Store? Interesting! I have lived in Hampton Roads area briefly until 1982 when, we had People’s Drugs. Now, it’s gone and Walgreens have been added and it’s too costly. And, I remembered in early 80’s Rite Aid was only store that opened in San Antonio’s prestigious neighborhood. I have never shopped there only Eckerd’s and others. Until Rite Aid went out of business. In 2001 lot of Eckerd’s was shut down in 2001 in Texas and some locations was taken over by CVS. They gave me a EXTRA CARE pays you back card. Did, I get a good discount? Nope. Do our insurance plans accept at CVS? No. Rite Aid serves in nor’easter includes Ohio. Try Rite Aid online time see if any stores nearest you. And, I don’t shop CVS for years. $$$$. And yes Walmart is lot cheaper.

@@rbsmith3365 I had a People's Drug when I was growing up in Virginia and it later changed to CVS. People Drugs begin in Washington, DC

Where I live, nearly every CVS and Walgreens are within a few blocks of one another and my family jokes that there must be a law requiring that. Maybe there was a similar law in that town as well. 😁

I live in Brighton (Boston) Massachusetts and our Walgreens is just a turn away from our CVS/pharmacy.

McDonald's and Burger King do the same thing, quite a bit. Only they are usually across the street from each other.

I love the mom and pop stores, though they are hard to find. We had one nearby that was just like walking back into the 50's. The owner was the pharmacist. One day an armed man came in and held up the store. The owner shot and killed him. Shortly after that the store closed.

Been there a lot of times. 😀

Loved going there for concerts.

Is Eckerd College still there?

CVS is like that now.

What is YAT?

@@bostongirlsandy Thanks for asking! There are several different accents (I would say at least five) that different people from New Orleans have, but one accent which most blue-collar white people (and some mixed-race white/black Creole people too) in our wonderful city once had is called the Yat accent. Sadly most people in America outside Louisiana (and maybe the other Gulf Coast states) don't realize how most whites and Creoles in New Orleans have this very unique accent. There seems to be this assumption in most of America that most New Orleanians (many of us call ourselves Yats, including me) have the exact same Southern accent which can be found in every Southern state, but we actually have an accent which is quite unique because it sounds a lot more like a traditional New York (city) accent than it does the traditional Southern accent found outside New Orleans. Since you (I assume based on your name!) are from Boston, I also should point out that the Yat accent also is rather similar to the traditional Boston accent. People in Rhode Island also have an accent which shares lots of similarities with Yat. The celebrity chef named Emeril (Lagasse) is originally from Fall River, Massachusetts... but he has spent much of his life in New Orleans and has become an expert on the local cuisine here. I've met more than one person in my life who mistakenly assumed he was a Yat (due to his accent) before they found out he actually is a New Englander and still has his native accent! And there are MANY Yats (myself included) who have been mistaken for either New Yorkers or New Englanders (especially Bostonians) when traveling to almost anywhere in the USA outside Louisiana. Even when I've been to North Texas, people assumed I was a New Yorker, and so did people in Florida (near Tampa) perhaps because there are LOTS of New Yorkers and New Englanders who move down to Florida. The Yat accent does have some similarities to the traditional Southern accent, but most people in America (especially California) seem to think it sounds much more Northeastern than it does Southern. I'm sure there are plenty of Southerners (mostly those outside Louisiana) who might be fooled when hearing a Yat accent and assume the person talking is a Northern "Yankee" (and a Yankee from either of the two Northern cities which are considered the two most "Yankee" cities anywhere in America!) instead of a Southerner from the most famous city in the Deep South! I highly recommend you do a Google search for Yat accent videos on RU-vid... there's a RU-vid user by the name of "mehrvigne" who made a FANTASTIC video about the Yat accent and the related New Orleans dialect. Does she sound like a Rhode Islander to you?

@Tim Reimers(open): Yeah; we had a Fay's next to the Hills in the Buffalo suburbs. In 1996 or 1997, Eckerd took them over.

And before that Fays bought out Carls Drugs.

Remember a big Grand Union in Matawan NJ & there are still Acme's around. One in Lincroft NJ & Doylestown PA

Yup, Thrifty Drug in Los Angeles County, plus San-on Drug and Rexall Drugs. Also, in the '70s, GEMCO department store, eventually bought out by Target in the Sacramento area.

ACME was my childhood supermarket. It closed in the early 80s. It was great that everyone; the checkers, butcher & manager knew many customers by name.

Grand union was part of Giant. I'm thinking Giant just liquidated them .

Omg Dart Drug, I worked my first job there in the early 70s in MD.

CVS actually bought Eckerd in southern states while Rite Aid took over all the others.

@@christiangonzales7429 And Walgreens bought out Rite-Aid and now they are gone also.

@@tearosy Walgreens didn't buy out Rite Aid 100%, only some stores. The DOJ wouldn't allow them to do a full merger as it would have created a monopoly.