CVS Pharmacy Shots vs CVS Minute Clinic Shots = Yikes!

CVS came to town, bought some expensive realestate and built a new fancy store across from the neighborhood Walgreens... big digital sign and everything.. it is an empty shell now, lasted about 4 years... I don't think corporate is very smart at CVS... and a 2 miles north & south are additional Walgreens...

Both CVS and Walgreens are having problems keeping staff around here. One CVS and one Walgreens have recently closed. Others are closing early, closing for lunch, opening late. They both have a reputation of being difficult to work for. My wife is in the business, so I get inside information. She regularly gets offers from both chains to come to work for them at a fairly large increase in wages, but she said there's no way she'd work there unless there was no other choice.

If I'm not mistaken the Minute Clinics are run by a company other than CVS. It's also fairly common for pharmacies inside grocery stores and other big box stores to be run by another company (or in some cases by an independent pharmacist). For example, CVS runs all the pharmacies in Target stores.

There are still several independent pharmacies here as well. Probably will be one less soon, though. The biggest one recently sold out, and the new owners are refusing to accept many insurance plans that the previous owner did. Of course, those customers are transferring their business elsewhere.

We recently switched to a locally owned independent pharmacy after decades using the local Walgreens' branch. Here's the story:

The Walgreens' pharmacy was closed one Friday when their pharmacist called in sick. They had no backup - they were closed Friday, Saturday and Sunday! All this after the robot phone entity had assured me my RX (a maintenance RX) would be ready anytime that Friday.

The "store" manager said she showed up at 1 p.m. that day to find the pharmacy closed - she had no prior notice of the closure and no idea when the pharmacy would reopen! I muttered a few choice phrases and left.

Got my doc to call a locally owned independent pharmacy to fill the RX and switched everything over to them. Open 7 days a week. Story they told was that Walgreens, CVS were having trouble hiring and keeping pharmacists.

Since then the local Walgreens branch in question is closed both Saturday and Sunday and has reduced their Monday-Friday hours.

Pretty sad if you ask me.

My wife graduated college in 1978, a close friend the next year with a Masters in Pharmacy. Today the Condo two doors down is a series of Pharmacists that are PhD. We ask the family friend if the needed education change that much in 45 years (from a 5-year Master's to an 8-year PhD)?

Her response: The actual info didn't change much, but the cost did! A $5000 degree (The Ohio State University) in 1979 to a $110,000 now! (also OSU) And the affordable ones are all retiring! Maybe the students require longer to get the training or maybe an education conspiracy; probably a lot of both! (I had an immigrant that was a purity inspector for a whole district in a former communist country, our country wouldn't accept his credentials. 15 years ago is was close to $40,000 for him to get certified! (so he painted ghetto apartments, and lived better than in Albania!)

Youngest son's wife has a BS in Chemistry, she's a stay-at-home mom and sell "Collectables" online and is money ahead of being a Cancer Research Chemist or Quality Control Chemist for beauty products.

Ivan

Ivan the Butcher said:

My wife graduated college in 1978, a close friend the next year with a Masters in Pharmacy. Today the Condo two doors down is a series of Pharmacists that are PhD. We ask the family friend if the needed education change that much in 45 years (from a 5-year Master's to an 8-year PhD)?

Her response: The actual info didn't change much, but the cost did! A $5000 degree (The Ohio State University) in 1979 to a $110,000 now! (also OSU) And the affordable ones are all retiring! Maybe the students require longer to get the training or maybe an education conspiracy; probably a lot of both! (I had an immigrant that was a purity inspector for a whole district in a former communist country, our country wouldn't accept his credentials. 15 years ago is was close to $40,000 for him to get certified! (so he painted ghetto apartments, and lived better than in Albania!)

Youngest son's wife has a BS in Chemistry, she's a stay-at-home mom and sell "Collectables" online and is money ahead of being a Cancer Research Chemist or Quality Control Chemist for beauty products.

Ivan

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There was actually a time (in Texas at least) when a B.S. was good enough to become a R.Ph. I worked with one who was near retirement many years ago. He was a very good pharmacist with only a B.S. degree. Then it became a Master's and later a doctorate profession. Most pharmacists today have the doctorate. I've known only one who insisted on being referred to as Doctor. I mean, she was a doctor, but . . .

I can also remember when pharmacists were paid around $13 / hour. Now it's closer to $70. Are the new pharmacists that much better than the old ones? Probably not, but there is a lot more to the job than just counting pills.

"All three of those have high customer service ratings. We chose Meijer as they were the closest to our new place. We are well pleased."

Have to walk to the rear of the store in all three here. Old independant walked in to the counter, got your stuff and out the door.

Walgreen's has 'lunch' break - Everyone out of the pharmacy - Windows closed. Sit and wait or plan your trip accordingly.

Have been reading that many pharmacies are having trouble keeping people.

$70k per year and a PHD? With what a pharmacist has to know and the costs involved, $70k is probably not enough to keep good people.

"All three of those have high customer service ratings. We chose Meijer as they were the closest to our new place. We are well pleased."

Have to walk to the rear of the store in all three here. Old independant walked in to the counter, got your stuff and out the door.

Walgreen's has 'lunch' break - Everyone out of the pharmacy - Windows closed. Sit and wait or plan your trip accordingly.

Have been reading that many pharmacies are having trouble keeping people.

$70k per year and a PHD? With what a pharmacist has to know and the costs involved, $70k is probably not enough to keep good people.

CVS always busy on refills. use their automated refill, but I do call ahead of time to see if any other scripts are ok to fill!! received RSV and flu at the same time this year.

TX-Dennis said:

Both CVS and Walgreens are having problems keeping staff around here. One CVS and one Walgreens have recently closed. Others are closing early, closing for lunch, opening late. They both have a reputation of being difficult to work for. My wife is in the business, so I get inside information. She regularly gets offers from both chains to come to work for them at a fairly large increase in wages, but she said there's no way she'd work there unless there was no other choice.

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My brother-in-law and my oldest granddaughter are both pharmacists. Neither ever considered working in a retail pharmacy. My BIL (now retired) worked for a mail order pharmacy, and even though it had sweatshop-like working conditions, he said it was still better than working retail. My granddaughter heard so many horror stories about retail, she took a year-long post-doctoral residency at a med school hospital so she could get certified as a hospital pharmacist. Those are the most desirable jobs, and she's currently the ICU pharmacist for a highly regarded hospital.

Ivan the Butcher said:

My wife graduated college in 1978, a close friend the next year with a Masters in Pharmacy. Today the Condo two doors down is a series of Pharmacists that are PhD. We ask the family friend if the needed education change that much in 45 years (from a 5-year Master's to an 8-year PhD)?
Ivan

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TX-Dennis said:

There was actually a time (in Texas at least) when a B.S. was good enough to become a R.Ph. I worked with one who was near retirement many years ago. He was a very good pharmacist with only a B.S. degree. Then it became a Master's and later a doctorate profession. Most pharmacists today have the doctorate. I've known only one who insisted on being referred to as Doctor. I mean, she was a doctor, but . . .

I can also remember when pharmacists were paid around $13 / hour. Now it's closer to $70. Are the new pharmacists that much better than the old ones? Probably not, but there is a lot more to the job than just counting pills.

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My granddaughter spent two years taking pre-pharmacy undergrad courses and was admitted to pharmacy school after her sophomore year. Pharmacy school is four years long. She was awarded a Bachelor of Pharmacy degree after her second year, and a Doctor of Pharmacy degree (PharmD) when she finished. I don't know exactly what her salary is, but $70/hr works out to about $150k per year, which sounds about right. She's rapidly paying off her student loans, which makes her dad very happy.

And here's some useful information from my granddaughter the hospital pharmacist. If you're ever hospitalized, be sure your list of medications is accurate. She regularly has to block doctor-ordered medications from being administered to patients because they would interact with existing medications and would result in the death of the patient. She's well-paid, but she earns it.

swsig said:

And here's some useful information from my granddaughter the hospital pharmacist. If you're ever hospitalized, be sure your list of medications is accurate. She regularly has to block doctor-ordered medications from being administered to patients because they would interact with existing medications and would result in the death of the patient. She's well-paid, but she earns it.

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Good advice. Ruthie is my medical advocate both as a wife and an LPN. The times I have been hospitalized she has gone over and verified my med list with the attending doctors and nurses.

She is my corner gal.

tinkerer said:

"All three of those have high customer service ratings. We chose Meijer as they were the closest to our new place. We are well pleased."

Have to walk to the rear of the store in all three here. Old independant walked in to the counter, got your stuff and out the door.

Walgreen's has 'lunch' break - Everyone out of the pharmacy - Windows closed. Sit and wait or plan your trip accordingly.

Have been reading that many pharmacies are having trouble keeping people.

$70k per year and a PHD? With what a pharmacist has to know and the costs involved, $70k is probably not enough to keep good people.

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Not $70K / year. $70 / hour =$145,600 / year or more with OT.

Just remember Big Brother is watching out for pharmacies too.

Walmart for us mostly. The Pharmacy in Cody is good and after a while you know the pharmacists and techs. First name basis too. But we do get certain meds online

$70k / yr - My bad.

$70 / hr - Better.

Yaworski said:

The CVS near me closes the pharmacy for lunch every day. The pharmacy also closes long before the store does. I'm told that it is because there is a shortage of pharmacists.

I stay with CVS because my prescription coverage is through them and I get a better deal there than if I go to Walgreens.

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CVS screwed up when they got into competition with Walgreens for #1 and started buying out small / independent pharmacies. They pooped on the CVS employees to have the capital to do this. Of course, the plandemic impacted their workforce too; people being paid to stay home and not work.

Oldest son is a PhD pharmacist and started working at CVS as a PharmTech while in undergraduate college. Back then there were at least 4 PharmTechs every day. By the time he became a pharmacist, CVS had cut the support staff back to 1 or 2 PharmTechs per day. At his last store, he only had 1 PharmTech per day, and a lot of times they would call in sick or go home early, claiming to be sick, etc. So, he had to run things by himself. If he had to go to the bathroom, he had to close the pharmacy. He finally had enough and told CVS to FO and went to work at Winn Dixie. Well, then Aldi bought WD and shut down all the WD pharmacies. He was out of work for a couple of months (CVS called and offered him a pharmacy 100 miles away, which he declined), but now he has gotten into Nuclear Pharmacy at a hospital.

I had one script that I got at a local Winn-Dixie market. They got bought out by Aldi and the first thing they did was close the pharmacy. They sent all the scripts to CVS. My script cost me $20.00 a month at Winn-Dixie. I called CVS to renew my script and they told me it was going to be $1,050.00. I told them no way, I would do without it before I paid that. The clerk said "Oh wait, I've got a discount coupon on that one." The discounted price was $750.00. Still won't work. Maybe I missed something, but if I did they didn't tell me about it. I called a family owned drug store and they quoted me $22.00 for the same script. After dealing with them for three months I was impressed enough with their service that I moved the rest of my meds from Walmart to Mom and Pop. I was tired of Walmart constantly being out of stuff and screwing up what they had anyway. I don't know what is going on with CVS and don't care because I will never darken their door.

We had a intersection close by with a Rite-Aid, Walgreens and CVS occupying 3 or the four corners. All that remains is the Walgreens. The other 2 corners are now a Dollar Tree and a Starbucks. If that's a step up from the pharmacies, they must have really sucked. We've used the local Wegmans Pharmacy for decades. We are in the market almost every day anyway and their excellent customer service carries over to their druggists. They too offer various free shots.