Marquette Campus Walgreens Celebrates 80th Anniversary, Continued Service and Dedication to Community

Store is the chain’s second oldest still operating at its original location

DEERFIELD, Ill., September 22, 2011 - Walgreens (NYSE: WAG) (NASDAQ: WAG) today celebrates the 80th anniversary of its location at 16th Street and Wisconsin Avenue in Milwaukee, the second oldest store in the Walgreens chain still operating at its original location. The store opened its doors on Sept. 22, 1931 and continues to serve Marquette University students and the neighboring community.

Walgreens will mark the day with an anniversary cake and special sales.

“Outside of one other Walgreens in Tennessee, no other store in the chain has ever celebrated this milestone,” said Walgreens district manager Rob Wucki. “For eight decades, we’ve been the go-to destination for the health and daily living needs of Marquette students and the community at large. We’re proud to call 16th and Wisconsin home and committed to many more years of service to come.”

A history of innovation

In the 80 years since this location opened, Walgreens has pioneered many modern store and pharmacy features, some of which have become standards in the industry. Among those concepts are:

  • Computerized pharmacies connected nationwide, introduced in 1981 by Walgreens with its Intercom computer system.
  • Point-of-sale scanning — completed chainwide in 1991.
  • Freestanding stores with drive-thru pharmacies, introduced in the early 1990s. Since 1994, most new Walgreens have included a drive-thru pharmacy, and today more than 80 percent of Walgreen stores offer this convenience.
  • Nationwide rollout of one-hour photofinishing and digital photo services, now available at virtually all Walgreens stores.
  • "Touch-Tone Prefills" allow patients to order prescription refills and pickup times via phone. Prescriptions can also be refilled online or through Auto Refills, which automatically refills a prescription and sends an e-mail reminder when it's ready.
  • Prescription label instructions printed in any of 14 languages, a service introduced chainwide in 2002.
  • Large-type prescription instructions, introduced in October 2004. Walgreens became the first drugstore chain to offer this innovation, which benefits the more than 16 million Americans with some form of vision impairment.
  • Walgreens smart phone apps offer features including text messaging to alert pharmacy customers when their prescription is ready for pickup, and Refill by Scan which enables users to scan the barcode printed on a prescription label to seamlessly order a refill in seconds.
  • Walgreens was the first drugstore to offer immunizations daily nationwide with no appointment necessary.

Go to www.walgreens.com/pharmacy for more on Walgreens full suite of industry-leading pharmacy services

About Walgreens

Walgreens (www.walgreens.com) is the nation's largest drugstore chain with fiscal 2011 sales of $72 billion. The company operates 7,760 drugstores in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Each day, Walgreens provides nearly 6 million customers the most convenient, multichannel access to consumer goods and services and trusted, cost-effective pharmacy, health and wellness services and advice in communities across America. Walgreens scope of pharmacy services include retail, specialty, infusion, medical facility and mail service, along with respiratory services. These services improve health outcomes and lower costs for payers including employers, managed care organizations, health systems, pharmacy benefit managers and the public sector. Take Care Health Systems is a Walgreens subsidiary that is the largest and most comprehensive manager of worksite health and wellness centers and in-store convenient care clinics, with more than 700 locations throughout the country.

 

Contact(s)

Walgreens
Robert Elfinger, (847) 315-2962
http://news.walgreens.com
www.twitter.com/WalgreensNews