Walgreens turnaround continues with 450 stores to be closed this year
Could a Walgreens near me be closing? Yes, it could. The major pharmacy chain is closing about 1,200 stores in the U.S. Locations in Chicago and San Francisco are among reported closings.
Mike Snider
Walgreens is continuing to close stores as part of its turnaround plans.
The thinning of Walgreens locations has been in the works. Walgreens said in October 2024 it planned to close about 1,200 underperforming stores across the U.S. as a way to offset declining profits resulting from low drug reimbursement rates and sluggish retail sales.
The way made sense, because about 25% of Walgreens stores were “not currently contributing to our long-term way,” Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. CEO Timothy Wentworth said in June 2024 during a call with capital distribution analysts about the corporation’s quarterly financials.
Those 1,200 stores will be closed over three years, with about 500 to be closed in the corporation’s financial year 2025, which ends in August 2025, Walgreens said.
The corporation closed 70 stores in its first quarter of financial 2025, which ended Nov. 30, 2024, Wentworth said Friday in an analyst conference call. Walgreens plans to close about another 450 stores through the complete of 2025, he said.
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Walgreens, which has about 8,500 locations in the U.S. (and more than 3,600 Boots branded stores in the U.K. and elsewhere), has closed about 2,000 locations over the history decade, Wentworth said. “We expect to significantly ramp the pace of our store closures from the first quarter level,” he said.
“When you look at our stores, the stores that were not on the closure list, we view those stores being materially stronger, still not where they require to be, but materially stronger than the stores that we’re closing,” Wentworth said.
Investors appear bullish on the corporation’s advancement in its $1 billion expense-cutting program. Shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance have risen 35% since the corporation reported its Q1 financials on Jan. 10.
Walgreens locations closing in San Francisco, more
Walgreens did not provide a list of stores where closings are planned in coming days. But reports of Walgreens stores set to close in February are cropping up.
Among the closings: A location in Tallahassee set to close as of Feb. 25, reported by the Tallahassee Democrat, and one in Quincy, Massachusetts (Feb. 27) reported The Patriot Ledger, which like the Democrat, is part of the USA TODAY Network.
Other locations closing include:
- Augusta, Georgia: One store set to close Feb. 20, reported by WRDW and WAGT information.
- Chicago: Five locations expected to close between Feb. 17 and Feb. 27, reported by WGN.
- Oakland, California: Two stores, one closing Feb. 24, the other Feb. 27, reported by KTVU.
- Rockford, Illinois: One store set to close Feb. 19, reported by WTVO.
- San Francisco: A dozen locations are reportedly closing Feb. 24-27, The San Francisco Standard reported.
Contributing: Peter Blandino and TaMaryn Waters, USA TODAY Network and Reuters.
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