Rite Aid Corporation, through its subsidiaries, operates retail drugstores in the United States. Rite Aid Corporation company’s drugstores primarily offer pharmacy services. It provides prescription drugs and front end products, which include over-the-counter medications, health and beauty aids, personal care items, cosmetics, household items, beverages, convenience foods, greeting cards, seasonal merchandise, and various other everyday and convenience products, as well as photo processing products. The company sells its products under the Rite Aid brand. It offers its products to customers covered by third party payors, such as insurance companies, prescription benefit management companies, government agencies, private employers or other managed care providers. As of February 27, 2010, Rite Aid Corporation operated 4,780 retail drugstores in 31 states, as well as in the District of Columbia. It has a strategic alliance with GNC to operate GNC stores within Rite Aid stores. Rite Aid Corporation was founded in 1927 and is headquartered in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania.

Shoppers Drug Mart (SDM) is Canada's only nationwide drugstore chain, with locations in every province and two territories. With more than 1,200 drugstores, it's #2 north of the border, behind Katz Group. Most of the company's stores fly the Shoppers Drug Mart banner (Pharmaprix in Quebec). It also operates about 65 Shoppers Home Health Care stores. SDM ranks as a leading Canadian retailer of beauty products, with more than 225 in-store beauty boutiques that sell prestige cosmetics, fragrances, and skin care products. It is expanding in Quebec by opening new stores and acquiring independent pharmacies. The firm was founded in 1962 by Murray Koffler, a Toronto druggist.

Founded as a single shop in 1966, Superdrug was sold to home improvement chain Kingfisher plc in 1987. Today, Superdrug and its sister chain, discounter Savers, are owned by A.S. Watson (ASW), the retail and manufacturing subsidiary of the Hong Kong-based conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa. The fast-growing retail chain has been remodeling its existing stores, including converting more than 200 Savers stores to the Superdrug banner. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's Superdrug Stores, the UK's #2 health and beauty retailer (behind Alliance Boots). Superdrug Stores Plc operates more than 910 stores -- each with fragrance offerings and about 215 with in-house pharmacies -- in England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.

Founded in 1890 by George H. Bartell Sr., the company is still family owned and operated. In addition to its core commercial operations, Bartell Drug contributes to some 40-plus local and national charities, including the Red Cross, The Salvation Army, and Seattle Animal Shelter. If any drugstore chain has a prescription for longevity, it's Bartell Drug Company. The nation's oldest drugstore chain, 120-year-old Bartell Drug offers the usual mixture of prescription drugs, OTC medications, personal care products, and convenience items, as well as electronics such as digital cameras and MP3 players; stores also offer digital photo processing services.

The Jean Coutu Group (PJC) is one of Canada's leading drugstore chains with more than 375 franchised outlets in New Brunswick, Ontario, and Quebec under the PJC Jean Coutu, PJC Clinique, PJC Sante, and PJC Sante Beaute banners. The company dominates the Quebec market but trails rivals Shoppers Drug Mart and Katz Group in overall store count. Its Pro-Doc subsidiary (acquired in 2007) makes generic drugs. In mid-2007 the company sold its troubled US arm, the Brooks Eckerd chain of more than 1,850 drugstores, to Rite Aid in a cash-and-stock deal valued at about $4 billion. The sale made PJC Rite Aid's largest shareholder with about 28% of the firm's shares.

Thrifty White Drug Stores is big on small towns. The pharmacy chain operates about 85 traditional drugstores in rural Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, North and South Dakota, and Wisconsin. While most stores are located in shopping centers or strip malls, about 10 pharmacies operate in supermarkets and health clinics. Thrifty White Drug Stores is employee-owned and typically locates its shops in towns with populations of 1,000 to 90,000 people. Thrifty White Drug Stores also has several tele-pharmacies in North Dakota to serve communities that are too small to support a full-scale retail pharmacy. Thrifty White Drug Stores traces its roots to a single store opened in the Dakota Territory of Jamestown in 1884.

Founded in 1977, Uniprix is a growing alliance of independent pharmacy operators who together own Uniprix company. Uniprix has vaulted into the #1 spot in the Quebec drugstore market (ahead of rival Jean Coutu). The chain operates about 390 drugstores under the Uniprix, Unipharm, Uniclinique, and Clinique Sante banners. (With about 360 pharmacies, Jean Coutu is still Quebec's largest chain by revenue.) Drugstores flying the Uniprix banner account for more than half of the company's locations. Many Uniprix locations are superstores averaging 7,500 sq. ft. Unipharm outlets are mid-size neighborhood shops, while Unipharm and Uniclinique are smaller pharmacies adjacent to medical centers and seniors' residences.

In 1978 a group of 13 pharmacists banded together to form what is now known as Value Drug Mart Associates Ltd. Their mission was clear—to provide quality healthcare and great products in community-minded, independently owned and operated stores. Today, the association consists of 35 member shareholder Value Drug Mart stores, 11 Apple Drugs member stores, 11 Rxellence Professional Dispensaries, and 300 affiliated stores. Our Central Office and Distribution Centre in Edmonton, AB is located in 85,000 square feet that is owned and operated by the member shareholders, under the direction of an elected Board of Directors. The original concept of the founding member shareholders was to provide the existing and future member shareholders with an organization designed to provide increased profitability to individual store owners rather than to create a wholesale profit centre. That direction remains to this day.

Walgreen Co., together with its subsidiaries, engages in the operation of a chain of drugstores in the United States. The company’s drugstores sell prescription and non-prescription drugs, and general merchandise. Its general merchandise comprises household products, convenience foods, and seasonal items, as well as personal care, beauty care, candy, and photofinishing products. The company offers its products and services through drugstores, as well as through mail, telephone, and the Internet. As of August 31, 2010, it operated 8,046 locations in 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and Guam. Walgreen company also owns 37 strip shopping malls. Walgreen Co. was founded in 1901 and is based in Deerfield, Illinois.

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