Three years after eliminating tobacco products from its shelves and adding “health” to its name, CVS is now moving most junk food away from the storefront, banning sales of low-protection sunscreens and eliminating foods containing artificial transfats.
Helena Foulkes, who runs the company’s retail business, tells The Wall Street Journal the changes are part of CVS’s effort to stand apart from rivals by focusing on health care goods and services.
Those moves also put the company on a different path from its main competitor, Walgreens.
Walgreens says it isn’t a retailer’s job to keep shoppers from their vices and that consumers should be able to make unhealthy choices if they want to. But like CVS, it is trying to boost sales by appealing to a more health-conscious shopper.
Walgreens sells cigarettes but offers smoking-cessation help in the form of specially trained pharmacists and quitting aids. It is keeping candy up front but has added fresh fruit and vegetables in other parts of the store. It also has a loyalty program that rewards shoppers with points for exercise and health monitoring that can be used on purchases.
“There’s a level of making things available so it’s the customer’s choice, and there’s a level of incentivizing the customer,” Alex Gourlay, Walgreens co-operating chief, says.
CVS’s latest moves are subtle. It will still sell candy bars at the front register but is moving the main snack aisle, with its bags of candies, sweets, chips and other munchies, to the middle of the store. Candy accounts for roughly 5% of overall drugstore revenue, according to Nielsen.
