Walgreens — Local services in New Haven

Okay so I still came here even though this place is riddled with bad reviews. The reason why this location isn’t so great is probably because of the following I observed:

It’s one of the few Walgreens within reasonable walking distance to all the people that work and study at the Yale facilities nearby and the multitude of people that live in the area too…many of whom may not have a vehicle either. There’s just a really high demand for it due to proximity and population…which was obvious from the lack of other stores that sell essentials in the neighborhood and the really crowded store I walked into today. The next nearest stores aren’t for a few more miles and a lot of people don’t have the ability to make their way to further locations without spending extra time and money…which a lot of us don’t have. If you don’t like what’s stocked here go somewhere else with better inventory 🤷🏽‍♀️

A lot of things were out of stock, probably due to what I specified earlier compounded with an obvious understaffing issue and possible supply chain issues. It behooves Walgreens corporate to arrange for more shipments if they run out of a whole lot of essentials frequently. It is a high traffic Walgreens and they should make an effort to keep up with the demand on the corporate end.

The employees were nice when I went and honestly if I was working here I would’ve been mad a lot of the time too. Not having enough people to help you stock shelves and deal with customers is frustrating enough and corporate could probably alleviate this stress by raising their salaries and offering more compensation for the cost of living in the area which is insanely high. Higher pay equals happier and nicer employees and more people wanting to work for you…definitely wishful thinking but it has worked for other large corporations like Costco and Publix who do these things already.

It is also insanely expensive. Walgreens is already expensive everywhere else, but this one was nuts. I spent $35 on a handful of items that I could carry back to my Airbnb on foot.

I just came in for some bare essentials to tide me over until the weekend when I can make it to a bigger supermarket. They had some stuff that worked fine for what I needed. I wouldn’t depend on this place for my main needs, just for a couple quick items. I liked that I could walk here from work nearby...and I’m sure everyone else around...

Long rant; no TL:DR. This review is SOLELY in regards to the pharmacy area and the COVID-19 vaccine area. With the store itself, the cashiers are lovely and the store is stocked with everything that you’d expect would be at a pharmacy/convenience store.

For the love of GOD (or whatever you believe in, if anything), PLEASE move the COVID-19 vaccine line to a DIFFERENT part of the store!!! Can it be by the Photo Lab? That area is consistently empty no matter what time of day that I come here.

This is my 3rd time trying to pick up my prescriptions, and it makes no freaking sense at all why the rx pick up line has to be shared with people who are here for their vaccines.

As a heads up for people who’ve never come to this location, there is no drive-thru. What the hell is up with that?? They have the room to make one.

Each time I’ve tried to pick up here in the past two weeks, I’ve waited over 30 minutes and barely made it past a couple of spots. People have busy lives; we can’t keep wasting that kind of time.

Also, the pharmacy techs are constantly swamped and stressed out with these issues. They are wonderful people, but they need more employees to help them out. It’s not fair to them that they’re getting constantly verbally assaulted and blame for things they cannot control.

I switched my rx’s to Walgreens due to poor customer service from a different pharmacy chain. However, I’m at the point where I think I need to switch back. Obviously, this COVID vaccine issue will more than likely settle down within the next couple of months, but again, no one has the time to spend on this kind of issue.

Please do something about this and help those...

This walgreens is a DISGRACE. I stopped in to check if there were any good clearance items on my way home from subway near them as I do almost everyday. There weren't. So I made my way toward the exit and was body checked by a security guard, even though I'm 8 months pregnant. He then quickly flashed a plastic badge or something and wanted to search me. I asked him if he was a security guard, and he said no. I was confused. What was he then? He tried telling me he was a detective, therefore impersonating a police officer. I found out only later HES NOT A POLICE OFFICER. I let him start looking through my purse with everyone in the store now staring at me. Then he took me out back, through a locking door. The store manager, a badly mannered fat Hispanic lady, looked on, with an evil sneer on her lips. I had to empty the contents of my purse and jacket, which I did. Then, after it was quite clear I had none of their merchandise, and they were finished upsetting me and my unborn baby, I wasn't even offered an apology. In fact, the portly woman, no longer sneering, now was quite salty. (Guess they REALLY wanted to catch clearance item thieves) And the police-impersonating security guard just seemed indifferent. Neither cared that now my sandwich was cold, I was late now to pick up my son, and had to pay someone else to, or that I was basically called a thief in front of my neighbors and could've been hurt or my unborn child hurt. Nope. Not even an "our bad, sorry miss". Just salty indifference. Very unprofessional an ILLEGAL. This store is a disgrace to Walgreens...