Walgreens Reaps The Benefits Of Boosted Promotions

By Jennifer Lynn, contributing writer

Increases in promotional activity and loyalty programs elevate sales at the nation’s largest drugstore chain

The month of November was very friendly to Walgreens, as it is reporting sales of $6.07 billion for the month leading into the holiday shopping season. This marks an increase of more than 4 percent versus the same month last year. Fueling this sales growth is the company’s plan to increase promotional activity to boost in-store traffic and elevate comparable store sales, which it announced in June.

Walgreens has been working on a technology overhaul since last year. Leading the project is CIO, Tim Theriault, who seeks to improve customer engagement along with consolidating customer information from several checkout systems and customer rewards programs. The effort has come to fruition, supporting the new Balance Rewards loyalty program, in more than 7,900 Walgreens and Duane Reade stores. The re-launch of Walgreens’ Prescription Savings Club has also contributed to recent increases in sales and traffic. The Prescription Savings Club allows members to receive discounts on more than 8,000 brand name and generic medications, and more than700 value-priced generics are also offered as discount supply, increasing loyalty and elevating sales.

Furthering Walgreens’ efforts in leveraging promotional investments through loyalty programs is "Walgreens 2.0.” This programs aims at digitizing data to improve customer loyalty. Through the program customer’s earn points by using the loyalty card, and scanning in mobile rewards card information through mobile devices at any Walgreens store. Currently, the program averages more than 6 million “Walgreen 2.0” users per day.

Walgreens has leveraged it promotional investments through its loyalty programs. Customers can earn points with loyalty cards, scanning in mobile rewards card information with their mobile devices in any of its stores. “Walgreens 2.0” is aimed at digitizing its pharmacy chain’s data and to improve overall customer loyalty. The retailer has more than 6.1 million customers on average daily. Balance Rewards and Walgreens 2.0 will provide data on digital activities to help the company improve the customer experience and store interaction.

Meeting The Consumer Where They Want To Buy

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