Crimson Tide partisans push volume for Tuscaloosa stores

Drug Store News, Feb 20, 1989

Crimson Tide partisans push volume for Tuscaloosa stores

When the Crimson Tide rolls in, it's high tide for drug stores in Tuscaloosa, home of the University of Alabama and its legendary football team. Expanded back-to-school sections bulge with new and returning students, while colorful displays of soft drinks, beer, flasks and barbecue grills draw the tailgate-party crowd.

Harco Drug and Big B both have more than one store accessible to university students, and there are also independents in the environs.

Will Gosa, manager of Harco's store in Meadowbrook shopping center, near the campus, has several strings to his competitive bow: * Students can obtain check-cashing cards. * Service gets top priority. Four front checkouts assure quick in-and-out for students shopping between classes, and rainchecks enhance customer satisfaction. * The store is open from 8:00 a.m. to midnight six days, and 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Sundays. * The video department leads the chain in rentals, generating between $9,000 and $10,000 per month. Although there's video store next door, Harco beats its rental prices, $1.49 vs. $2.50, and 99 cents on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. "It brings students in twice: once to rent, once to return," says Gosa.

He doesn't see the campus store as competition, as "it's overpriced and we're convenient." And despite a university infirmary, the store enjoys a healthy portion of student prescription business, helped by referrals from a nearby private emergency medical clinic.

Besides school supplies, departments with large student trade include beverages, food and snacks, sunglasses (students account for about 60 percent of those sales), dental needs (about 50-percent student business), and cosmetics and skin care, especially acne preparations. Household chemicals and small appliances are also popular.

"Two-liter soda pop is tremendous all the time," said Gosa, who lays in extra stock for weekends.

Two Big B stores also find soda pop - and beer - a major student draw, notwithstanding that both stores share shopping centers with Bruno's-owned supermarkets. Big B runs almost weekly specials of 30- to 40-cents off Coke or Pepsi. Beer - bought on an in-and-out basis for promotions - might sell for $2.99, vs. $3.69 regular price. Big B and Harco compete aggressively on beverages.

Both of these Big B units are near apartment complexes that house large numbers of students. James Miller, manager of a Big B about one and a half miles from campus, says students scour newspaper ads for bargains, then flock in for hot specials on items such as soap powders, cosmetics, dental floss and toothbrushes. (Big B and Harco advertise in the Tuscaloosa newspaper and in the university's paper, The Crimson White.)

But they snap up high-ticket items, too: Miller sold out of Nintendos, at $99.88, before Christmas. Tape recorders at $70 sell well, as do radios and calculators.

Terence Davis, manager of another Big B unit that caters to students, devotes a valley to school supplies regularly, and expands to two valleys for back-to-school, increasing his selection of backpacks, pens, notebooks, folders and such.

He added that condoms sell well among students and noted that since November, home pregnancy kits are "starting to really pick up."