C+D exclusively revealed last week (April 17) that Tesco will move ahead to close eight of its in-store pharmacies just a few months after it first mooted the idea.
The supermarket chain put forward a raft of proposed changes to its businesses on January 31 in order to “remain focused and competitive in a fast-changing market”.
Read more: Revealed: Tesco to move ahead with plans to close eight in-store pharmacies
This included the news that eight pharmacies were at risk of closure “where there are other pharmacies within one mile of our store”, it said at the time.
It told C+D this month that it will close the pharmacies affected by the proposals from August – although it could not yet share their locations.
Read more: UPDATED: Tesco reveals proposals to close eight in-store pharmacies
But now, C+D can exclusively reveal where all eight closing pharmacies are located.
The eight branches due to close are scattered across England, the supermarket chain told C+D yesterday (April 25).
Tesco also told C+D that it made the difficult decision to close the eight 100-hour pharmacies because the branches are not seeing sufficient customer demand to sustain their long opening hours.
Read more: Supermarket sweep: Are large grocers falling out of love with pharmacy?
It said that it is supporting customers using the affected pharmacies to move their prescription requests to nearby pharmacies a short distance away.
But it added that the closing branches will continue to sell a wide range of general sale (GSL) medications such as paracetamol and ibuprofen in the main store.
List of locations in full
- Long Eaton Extra
- Reading Extra
- Fareham
- Glastonbury
- Widnes Extra
- Bradford Peel Centre
- Blackburn
- Catterick Garrison
Supermarket pharmacy closures
Announcing the proposals in January, Tesco told C+D that pharmacy staff made up a small proportion of those affected by its planned changes, relevant staff had been informed and it would work hard to find roles for those affected in nearby branches.
The announcement came just days after Asda revealed that seven of its in-store pharmacies were at risk of closure as part of a plan to “drive sustainable growth”.
Read more: UPDATED: Asda proposes closing seven pharmacies
The proposals would “affect 48 hourly-paid colleagues and 14 pharmacists” and the supermarket hoped to redeploy as many affected staff as possible, it said at the time.
The Asda branches earmarked for closure are located in Southampton, Seaham, Feltham, Blackburn, Adel, West Bradford and Weston-Super-Mare.
Read more: Lloydspharmacy quits Sainsbury’s: What we do (and don't) know so far
However, Asda could not confirm whether it will move ahead with the proposed closures when C+D approached it for comment earlier this month.
Asda’s announcement closely followed the news that Lloydspharmacy will withdraw from its 237 Sainsbury’s in-store pharmacies.
Read more: Lloydspharmacy exits Sainsbury’s: Locations of all the branches revealed
It remains unclear as to the fate of each of the affected pharmacies, as the multiple told C+D that it was "exploring options for each individual branch”.
Since then, the multiple has battled media reports that all of its branches are “at risk” of closure, although a spokesperson told C+D the multiple “does not comment on articles that have been published based on unverified information”.
