Tuesday, August 25, 2015

A Main Street Rite Aid

Welcome back to Allegany County, again! This time we visit a Rite Aid in Cuba (yes, the town's name is Cuba. I could go on a rant about how NY likes to copy country names and cities names from other countries as names for their towns, but I'll save you the trouble.) that was a former Eckerd location. What is unique about this location compared to other drug stores of this kind is that it actually is open along the town's Main Street. Especially in towns of this size, Rite Aid would typically just build a new store from the ground up. You would normally only see a store like this in cities. Cuba is not a city!


The windows have a blue tarp over them.
It's worth mentioning that this store is probably only around 5,000 sq.ft. The typical dollar store (e.g. Dollar General) is around 7,500 to 8,000. That actually makes this smaller than a dollar store if this is indeed at 5,000 sq. ft. The typical drug store is itself usually around 10,000 sq. ft.

A little step to lead you into the store.
Front checkout area. Rite Aid doesn't seem to use these. Any customer making purchases at the time I visited were made at the pharmacy desk in the back of the store.
The store's only selection of frozen food items and the obligatory beer takes a good portion of the display cases.

I assume that this checkerboard pattern is a remnant of Eckerd, but I'm not 100% certain on that. This sight would also would explain the blue tarp and no purchases being made at the front. They seem to be using the area as a mini-stockroom.
Mirror above the front checkouts.

Now for the actual aisles. The store only has five aisles in total and the contents of the aisles are as follows:


Aisle 1: Health
Aisle 2: Health
Aisle 3: Seasonal, Diapers, Cleaning and a limited selection of food
Aisle 4: Greeting Cards
Aisle 5: Stationary and Cosmetics
Obviously, with a much smaller footprint then typical Rite Aid, this store doesn't have everything you would find at a normal store. Notable things lacking are: a much larger food selection, toys and party supplies. Everything else is here, but likely shrunken is size.


Interesting to see a mirror set on a stool. 
Checkerboard tile stockroom.
The back of the store and pharmacy area. There is two chairs for customers waiting for their prescriptions.
Finally I leave you with a look at the doors at the front of the store as viewed from the inside:



One of the only reasons why this store probably still exists is because of it being an acquisition from Eckerd. Apparently this location does well enough for Rite Aid to continue operating it, despite being half the size of a normal location. I guess if it is profitable, you might as well keep it going. Either way, it is still a cool sight to see especially in this day and age where everything likes to be on the outskirts away from the downtown main street in small towns.

3 comments:

  1. Certainly is an uncommon sight! It would seem that only the pharmacy part is profitable, both from your pictures and description. But like you say, if it's making money, might as well keep cashing in...

    And lol at the NY rant :P (I literally live in Hernando DeSoto!)

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    1. Yeah, there's many but to name a few: Cuba, Mexico, Amsterdam, Rome, Greece, Chili and I'm sure there's more.

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    2. Sheesh! You've got the whole world in your state :P

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