Walgreens closing five stores in San Francisco due to crime

Organized retail crime is taking a heavy toll on some retailers in San Francisco.

Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. will close five Walgreens stores in San Francisco in November in response to ongoing organized retail crime in the city.  Retail theft across the company’s San Francisco stores has increased in the past few months to five times the chain’s average, Walgreens spokesperson Phil Caruso told the San Francisco Gate.

“Organized retail crime continues to be a challenge facing retailers across San Francisco, and we are not immune to that,” he stated. “To help combat this issue, we increased our investments in security measures in stores across the city to 46 times our chain average in an effort to provide a safe environment.”

In July, Target moved up the nightly closing time of its five stores in San Francisco, citing the city’s escalating retail crime.  San Francisco ranks as one of the top five cities in the country when it comes to organized crime. (According to the National Retail Federation, Los Angeles tops the list, followed by Chicago, Miami, and San Francisco.) 

In September, San Francisco Mayor London Breed and Police Chief Bill Scott announced that they will dedicate more police, beef up coordination and make it easier to report shoplifters.

Walgreens plans to move prescriptions and workers from the closed stores to nearby locations. Prescriptions will go to stores within a one-mile radius.  Walgreens has closed at least 10 of its stores in the city since the beginning of 2019, according to the San Francisco Gate.

The five Walgreens stores earmarked for closure are as follows:

• 2550 Ocean Ave., closing on Nov. 8;
• 4645 Mission St., closing on Nov. 11;
• 745 Clement St., closing on Nov. 15;
• 300 Gough St., closing on Nov. 15; and
• 3400 Cesar Chavez St., closing on Nov. 17.

With the closures, Walgreens will have closed a total of 22 stores in San Francisco in the past five years, reported the San Francisco Chronicle.