Lucky supermarket closing pharmacies in California, including Sonoma County locations

Pharmacies inside Lucky Stores’ supermarkets across California, including those in Sonoma County, will be closing, forcing patients to find other alternatives to get their prescription drugs and laying off personnel in the process.

Save Mart Cos., the parent company of Lucky, is moving pharmacy services from its Lucky and Save Mart supermarkets to Walgreens, Victoria Castro, spokeswoman for the Modesto-based chain, said Wednesday in a statement.

The company in its statement said it would work with patients in the transition and that Walgreens has “expressed great interest” in hiring the staff. But Castro did not answer further questions on the cause of the move or timing.

The local affected stores include the Petaluma supermarket at 939 Lakeville Highway and the location at Montgomery Village. The Petaluma pharmacy will close at 5 p.m. Aug. 24, while the Montgomery Village location is set to close Sept. 1.

The decision comes after a Los Angeles private-equity firm, Kingswood Capital Management, in March bought Save Mart, which owns 200 stores throughout California and Northern Nevada under the brands of Save Mart, Lucky California, and FoodMaxx.

A research paper by consulting firm Deloitte last year found “the traditional pharmacy model is ripe for disruption” as the retail-pharmacy business was flat while mail-order prescriptions had increased.

Annie Nicol, a nurse practitioner and director of homeless services with the Petaluma Health Center, runs a clinic at the Mary Isaak Center shelter that uses the Lucky location as its primary pharmacy — given it is right across the street.

With Lucky pharmacy’s closure and moving its services to Walgreens, she said, many of the shelter’s occupants, as well as seniors, those with mobility constraints and those without access to transportation, will face challenges when getting their medicine.

“We’ve worked with that pharmacy and our underserved, homeless population for years and they have been incredible,” Nicol said. “To get a notification that they’re closing on Aug. 24, (it) gives very little time to think about alternatives for this.”

Nicol and her colleagues are working to see if they can partner with a local prescription delivery service, but there are not many options that would provide regular service to the Petaluma area.

The closures come as there has been increased demand in hiring for both pharmacists and pharmacy technicians with many open positions in the industry, said Debbi Ling, office manager for Tuttle’s Pharmacy in Santa Rosa, which is locally owned.

“There’s just no technicians out there,” said Ling, who added some pharmacies have cut their hours because of such staffing issues.

Some stores also have sandwich boards outside their buildings that note they are hiring technicians. Tuttle’s has open positions as well.

Tuttle’s has experienced “a slight uptick” in customers in recent days, but she said she did not know if that could be related to Lucky customers opting to go elsewhere.

She added many local residents would prefer to go to independent pharmacies such as Tuttle’s, which was the only pharmacy that remained open in the immediate aftermath of the Tubbs Fire in 2017. But insurance carriers make it difficult with higher co-payment charges and restrictions on long-term orders compared to corporate-owned pharmacies, she said.

One of the qualities Nicol said she’ll miss most about working with the Lucky pharmacy is how personal the experience was, not only for her but also for customers.

“They’ve been very, very user-friendly, and going the extra mile — calling us if there’s a concern, helping with prior authorizations, immunizations,” Nicol said. “That’s a really big deal, too, for folks who don’t have transportation.”