Lewis puts South Dakota on chain map

Chain Drug Review, August 16, 2004 by David Pinto

The time has come to make Lewis Drug a mandatory part of any tour of chain drug retailing in America.

Granted, Sioux Falls, S.D., is somewhat off the beaten path, much as Bentonville, Ark., once was. But Mark Griffin, the man who heads up the drug chain co-founded by his father 62 years ago, runs what is arguably the most diverse and exciting regional drug chain in the country, one unmatched in the range and breadth of its merchandise mix and its success in selling a range of products beyond the knowledge or comprehension of most chain drug retailers.

Consider:

* Lewis operates 25 stores in two dramatically different formats--a conventional drug store and a format reminiscent of the superstores once run by such legendary chain drug retailers as Pay Less N.N. and Skaggs Drug Centers. The former, typically around 10,000 feet, is located in the small towns and communities surrounding Sioux Falls. The latter runs to 50,000 square feet and sells a range of merchandise more typical of a mass merchant than a drug store. But Griffin makes them both work by offering the customer a package of assortment, service and price unrivaled in southeastern South Dakota.

* Lewis succeeds because, despite its breadth of merchandise, pharmacy remains the retailer's focal point. Indeed, Griffin never lets the customer forget that she is in a drug store. To that end, the pharmacy always gets a prominent location, even in the 50,000-foot superstores. Moreover, it is supported by a complete assortment of health and beauty aids and diagnostic equipment. So it is that some 60% of Lewis' estimated $110 million in annual volume comes from the Rx/O-T-C mix.

* Despite this Rx emphasis, Lewis is the area's largest Weber gall retailer and its largest True Value dealer (under a franchise arrangement with that company). Its superstores function as local post offices, lottery ticket outlets and utility bill-paying centers. Customers can buy fresh flowers at the floral counter in a Lewis superstore, then have them wrapped at the service desk and shipped at the postal counter. A Lewis superstore customer can buy brand-name apparel at discount prices, convenience food, two gondolas of items paced at 99 cents and a range of electronics, sporting goods, garden supplies from centers located in the stores' parking lots, mobile phones, radios, $500 digital cameras, $600 television sets and such heavy equipment as lawn mowers, snow blowers and garden tractors carrying retail paces in four figures.

* Despite the daunting merchandise mix, in terms of health care Lewis offers services most drug chains don't even consider. A recent Melanoma Monday offered consumers free testing for skin cancer administered by area dermatologists. Each fall the retailer, in conjunction with local medical facilities, sets aside one day to provide flu shots in a program that last year attracted 10,000 customers. This year it will be expanded to two days. As well, Lewis offers a range of diagnostic tests throughout the year, among them cholesterol screenings.

The unlikely architect of this oasis on the plains is a 53-yearold South Dakotan who is equally at home on the prairie as he has become in Washington, D.C., where he recently served for 18 months as chairman of the National Association of Chain Drug Stores.

Griffin's management style is reminiscent of that of other regional chain operators. So it is that he has built a very capable senior and store-management staff, and allows that staff ample room to make and implement decisions, to try out new merchandise, to travel to industry gatherings to seek ideas and items. Yet he reserves the key decisions for himself, often made after extensive consultations with his senior staffers and an intensive study of the local market. In short, Mark Griffin is involved--with his company, with the competition, with the community.

The result of this involvement is a chain of drug stores that is, in terms of operational excellence and merchandising creativity, the best that Middle America has to offer--and a chain drug industry leader who is singularly equipped to lead it.