WISCONSIN RAPIDS – Hometown Pharmacy closed in Wisconsin Rapids.
As guests arrived at the pharmacy location Oct. 30, they were greeted with signs on the doors announcing the closure, explaining prescription records will be available at all Walgreens locations. It pointed guests to the nearest location at 3200 Eighth St. S., with store and pharmacy open 24 hours daily.
Barry Johnson, who opened the Wisconsin Rapids store in 2019 after Shopko sold its pharmacies, said the store’s last day was Oct. 29. As Johnson and his team were packing up the store Oct. 30, he told a Daily Tribune reporter it has become difficult for local pharmacies to keep up with changing costs, especially as pharmacy benefit managers kept changing reimbursement levels, setting how much pharmacies get paid.
Johnson said it was a difficult decision to close the Wisconsin Rapids store, especially thinking of the customers the store helped over the years. Johnson will continue serving Wisconsin Rapids customers at Walgreens, he said.
The Wisconsin Rapids store opened May 1, 2019, after Shopko sold its pharmacies to Kroger Co. the previous December. Johnson had been a pharmacist at Shopko for 12 years before the sale, and he wanted to open Hometown Pharmacy to fill a need and make sure the community would still be served in the same way they were used to.
Hometown Pharmacy is a group of independently owned and operated pharmacies throughout Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Rapids location closure was an independent decision and will not include the other local locations, Johnson said.
Contact Caitlin at cshuda@gannett.com or follow her on Twitter @CaitlinShuda.
This article originally appeared on Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune: Why Wisconsin Rapids Hometown Pharmacy is closed and what that means for customers
Reporting by Caitlin Shuda, Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune / Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune
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