The editorial “Will a bloated Walgreens swallow a bitter pill for Chicago?” (Dec. 15) does not go far enough in discussing the wrong direction in which the chain has gone.
When I pick up prescriptions, I am so alienated by Walgreens’ onerous marketing policies that I no longer buy any of the chain’s other products necessary to boost its bottom line. Maybe Americans have accepted being corralled into joining loyalty programs such as the one Boots Alliance requires for its customers to get deals. But the last few years, the chain has set new lows by restricting its discounts to rapidly expiring coupons and rewards points cumulated in previous purchases.
To make matters worse, Walgreens has more recently forced customers to buy in quantity to get reasonable prices. Does it not realize how inconvenient it is for people to find a place to store two items to get the third 50% off? Especially when they do the math and find they’re getting only a 16.67% overall discount?
Instead of positioning Walgreens to be everything for everybody, the chain should go back to its roots as a pharmacy by expanding its over-the-counter health care products, including lucrative medical equipment. Retain the greeting cards but limit the health and beauty products to the full lines of a select number of manufacturers with a dependable stock in a few price categories. Drop the ancillary groceries, household items and notions that Target, Walmart and dollar stores do better.
But most of all, Walgreens should install computerized prescription-retrieving systems such as the kind the dry cleaners use so that pharmacy assistants don’t have to waste valuable minutes manually leafing through alphabetized cardboard boxes for patients’ medications.
Lastly, the chain should find a better solution than locking up its goods to prevent shoplifting unless it wants to pay multiple personnel to roam the aisles and respond immediately to customers who want to make purchases.
— B. Elizabeth Mina, Chicago
Walgreens’ customer concern
Walgreens was always my family pharmacy of choice since childhood. Several years ago, CVS made a policy change to stop selling cigarettes out of concern for customer health. As a nurse, that made sense to me. I waited for Walgreens to do the same. When it did not, I severed my relationship with the chain and have not been in a store since.
Does Walgreens really care for its customers or is it all about the money?
— Carole Bogaard, Oak Lawn
Overhaul IDOT leadership
The editorial regarding the Kennedy Expressway reconstruction was spot-on for all of us who are frustrated every day on our way to work and less inclined to partake in events in the city on weekends (“Downtown Chicago paid too high a price for slowpoke, ill-conceived Kennedy Expressway construction,” Dec. 18). The one missing element is a lack of recognition of the miscalculations and failures of the Illinois Department of Transportation regarding the Jane Byrne Interchange project, which it completed just prior to starting the Kennedy project. Anyone entering the outbound lanes at Taylor Street, Jackson Boulevard or Madison Street experiences a bottleneck, which can lead to a long delay just to get through Hubbard’s Cave. There are multiple merging lanes from left to right, which the designers must have though would facilitate traffic flow but in practice have done the opposite.
The suggestion that the governor should reevaluate the leadership of IDOT is a necessity.
— Michael Ginsburg, Northbrook
Construction costing the city
The Tribune Editorial Board says everything I have been thinking for two-plus years. Why start on expressway construction right after COVID-19?
I employ 120 people and had to move our office from North and Elston avenues in Chicago to Rosemont after 50 years in the city. I take the train, but many employees just cannot or won’t. I insist everyone comes into the office, and half were going to quit thanks to this mess on the Kennedy Expressway. It was taking 1.5 to two hours from Northbrook, for example, to get to the office in Chicago.
The sad part is we will probably never move back. We signed a three-year lease in Rosemont, and everyone loves it here. Sad but true. A win for Rosemont and a loss for Chicago.
My story is a small fraction of the cost. The Kennedy debacle is costing Chicago a lot of money.
— Patrick Heneghan, Heneghan Wrecking & Excavating Co., Rosemont
Waiting to update software
With regards to the delay in opening the Kennedy Expressway’s reversible lanes, I have a very basic question. Couldn’t the work on the software to open and close the gates have been worked on at the same time as the jackhammering and paving work? Seriously, software programs are worked on in computer labs, not on highways.
The Illinois Department of Transportation should have been updating the software a year ago.
— Dan Croft, Riverwoods
No accountability for IDOT
The editorial criticizing the Illinois Department of Transportation’s ill-conceived Kennedy Expressway construction is well deserved. IDOT is a failed agency with no accountability. It is also embroiled in an unnecessary complaint brought by the Lake County state’s attorney before the Illinois Pollution Control Board over rumble strips installed on U.S. 41. This matter could have been easily resolved several years ago if not for IDOT’s intransigence.
— Bruce Nathanson, Highland Park
No longer a city that works
The editorial is spot-on in its criticism of the progress on the “slowpoke” Kennedy Expressway construction project. Sadly, the Illinois and Chicago Departments of Transportation over time have become very disappointing in their ability to deliver projects on time and on budget.
The lakefront bike and pedestrian path’s flyover section took longer to complete than San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge. And the West and South Loop communities are still looking at gridlock as the road construction project at Harrison and Canal streets at the old post office has now taken some three years.
Chicago’s unofficial motto in years past was “the city that works.” Sadly, that no longer seems to be the case.
— John McClorey, Chicago
2-hour wait for my Real ID
In his op-ed, Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias is correct that competent governance is key to a well-functioning city and state (“Competent governance is a good political strategy,” Dec. 17). Unfortunately, the recent two hours of waiting it took me, with an appointment, to get my Real ID wasn’t an example of that.
Before patting himself on the back too much, perhaps Giannoulias should ensure the system actually is an improvement. From my chair in the waiting room at the drivers service facility, it seemed like more of the same old.
— Lisa Kruse, Chicago
Submit a letter, of no more than 400 words, to the editor here or email letters@chicagotribune.com.