The Duane Reade-ificiation of Williamsburg Continues

Commenter "Abbott" is right. Duane Reade is a New York chain, started in Manhattan about 50 years ago, between Duane and Reade Streets (that's where they got the name).

Walgreens is from Illinois. Rite Aid is from Pennsylvania. CVS is from Rhode Island.

To give some perspective, Whole Foods is run by an anti-universal-healthcare libertarian zealot, and is from Texas.

Duane Reade is a local chain yes, but their prices are high and service is crap. Plus Duane Reade is being bought out by Walgreens, an even crappier corporate chain. So no, it won't be a locally owned business competing with Kings, it will be a corporate giant with a history of going into communities, opening stores, driving the local stores out of business, and then abandoning all but their highest performing locations, leaving communities with no drugstore at all.

If you want to show your stance against this then join http://www.facebook.com/#/group.php?v=wall&ref=mf&gid=253725521121

Isn't there another Duane Reade being built next to Kellogg's on Metropolitan & Keap? there's been construction in that lot for a while & a sign went up last year mentioning they were hiring. That's kind of ridiculous as far as saturating the neighborhood goes.

[then again, south Williamsburg only has the world's crappiest Walgreens on Union Ave, which i would LOVE to see replaced with a Duane Reade, or a gaping crater in the ground, or something more efficient. unless you count the total fail of a neighborhood drug store over on Broadway & Havemeyer. which stocks nothing useful, & if it did, you would still not be able to find it.]

You people do realize the Duane Reade is a LOCAL chain, right? Even though they are numerous, you only find them in NYC. It's so ironic that you're all bitching about supporting your "local businesses," when in realty that local business support is what made Duane Reade the NYC giant it is today. You are all so dumb.

And do you know that Walgreens is buying out Duane Reade?

This.

The Duane Reade "coming soon" sign went up a few weeks ago. I wept.

Aside from seeing more character being pushed away, this is a hallmark for SIGNIFICANTLY higher prices.

I don't know why someone is talking about "inefficient business models" above. We're talking about Duane Reade -- the same company that charges .99¢ - $1.38 for a candy bar that costs .50¢ anywhere else. Cashing in a free M&Ms coupon actually cost me money there this summer.

The only thing Duane Reade is efficient at, is driving up commercial leases in neighborhoods that end up with small drugstores being forced out. Their prices are insanely high across the board.

maybe you missed the word "if" in my post

Before I was forced out of my loft and left Williamsburg I'd intentionally spend more to support local buisness shopping at Northside Pharmacy and then Kings when they opened with a larger selection. It was still cheaper with the slightly higher retail prices when you factor in subway fare into Manhattan and back. Now they'll have competition for those low price shoppers who spend too much on rent but won't support family run business in their own neighborhood!

If Kings can offer comparable service at competitive prices, it will survive. Otherwise, why should people pay more to support an inefficient business model?

because they can shop for shampoo while listening to yaz, echo and the bunnymen, the smiths,english beat, the happy mondays, the cure, xtc, depeche mode, pil,siouxsie and the banshees and the god damn pet shop boys.

You're a good human. They will crush you.

completely.

if i'm trekking all the way over to bedford to go to the pharmacy, i'll end up at kings. i wish they'd expand into more parts of the neighborhood, though, so nobody would even want these duane reades!

OK. I'll just go ahead and say it; does anyone really fucking care?

I have an idea. It's called business. If you didn't want it to happen then you and everyone else with disposable incomes shouldn't have moved there.

I have an idea, too: If you "don't care," why are you commenting on the article? So I guess someone cares: you. And I appreciate your concern.

PS: Moving to a neighborhood does not equal wanting to see the small businesses in that neighborhood destroyed by the same dismal chains that have homogenized the rest of this city. Gothamist covers Williamsburg heavily; if you don't like that, stop reading the blog or stop reading (and commenting on) the articles they post about the neighborhood.

"small businesses in that neighborhood destroyed by the same dismal chains that have homogenized the rest of this city." That comment is straight out of the hipster hand book and why people loathe them.

This is disappointing. I know many say Williamsburg died years ago, but the chains popping up are really making that known. I feel like the average person in Williamsburg doesn't want a Duane Reade or a Subway though... So maybe it won't last. Right?

Duane Reade is a New York City-based local chain.

Here's a thought: Continue to patronize Kings, and avoid Duane Reade.

I, for one, wouldn't bet on King's survival; unless someone comes up with an app for all the hipsters' iPods that brainwashes them into going to Kings.

Or they look the other way on all those fake Oxycontin prescriptions...

YAY! This Could Be Anywhere.