Rite Aid Shutters Last Stores

Rite Aid (Philadelphia), once one of America’s biggest pharmacy chains, has shuttered its last 89 stores in recent days. The closures come in the wake Rite Aid filing for bankruptcy in May for the second time in less than two years, report a variety of news sources, including CNN.com.

Also in May, the drugstore announced had it sold most of its US stores’ pharmacy services to rivals CVS Pharmacy, Walgreens, Albertsons and Kroger, which together claimed more than 1000 locations.

The financially ailing company acknowledged the final store closings this past weekend on its website, which was stripped of all services content and replaced with a single page thanking customers for their patronage and providing them with separate links to request pharmaceutical records or locate another nearby pharmacy to fulfill prescriptions, per the previously mentioned May agreement.

Rite Aid, founded in 1962, grew to 2000-plus stores before beginning a downward spiral in recent years that culminated in these final closures. Rite Aid’s demise had two main causes, CNN noted: competition from other big chains and a major debt pile, which topped $4 billion due in large part to legal battles for the chain’s outlets allegedly filling unlawful opioid prescriptions.