Scott Swanson
Of The New Era
A former local pharmacist and several partners are establishing a new independent drugstore in Sweet Home, they announced last week.
Lee Land, who was a partner in Economy Drugs for more than 15 years and then was co-owner of the store when it was renamed Home Town Drugs, said the new store will be named Economy Drugs and will be located at Thriftway grocery market.
The new store will be owned and operated primarily by local pharmacist Jayme Calhoon, who is joining Land’s group after working for 12 years in Wal-Mart pharmacies, the last seven in Lebanon.
The opening of the new store comes on the heels of the closures of Home Town Drugs, in June, and Groves Pharmacy on Sept. 27. Both of those businesses were sold to Safeway, which currently operates the only pharmacy in Sweet Home.
The new pharmacy will be located where the coffee kiosk is now on the northwest side of Thriftway and will be accessible from inside the grocery store as well as from a drive-up window that will face the parking lot. The kiosk will be moved to the parking lot north of Thrifway, store manager Mark McDonald said.
The pharmacy will be a full-service drug store and will carry a full line of diabetic supplies, first aid supplies, a full line of braces and supplies, immunizations performed by pharmacists and compounding services, Calhoon said.
The partners said that they want to give local residents “a choice” when it comes to getting prescriptions filled.
“We want to bring service and competition to Sweet Home,” Land said. “Having run drug stores in Sweet Home before, and being familiar with the people, I want to provide the service they need.”
Land is CEO of the partnership which, he said, has member stores in Roseburg, Redmond, Prineville, LaPine and Madras.
Land said he and the group’s chief financial officer, Mike Mendazona, began planning to open a new store in Sweet Home after Home Town Drugs closed. When Groves closed, he said, “that pushed it to high priority.”
The key, he said, was getting Calhoon involved.
“Since Jayme has come on board, we’re 110 percent devoted to this project,” Land said.
Calhoon said he jumped at the chance to operate a store in the town where he grew up.
“I like the small-town pharmacy, the appeal of owning your own business in your home town,” he said. “The niche is wide open now.”
McDonald said having the pharmacy connected to Thriftway is “a good opportunity” for both.
“We’ve been excited since our first meeting about it,” he said of the arrangement. “This is something the community needs. Obviously, it will be good for Thriftway too.”
Land said the partners have appreciated Thriftway management’s willingness to work with them.
“We feel it will be a happy marriage that will benefit both of us,” he said.
Calhoon said the store is expected to open by the second week of November, or as soon as permitted, and will initially be staffed by him and a technician.
“When we open the main building, we’ll have at least two other people besides myself – maybe more – depending on how the business does,” he said.
The store’s hours will be 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturdays.
Until the Sweet Home store opens, local patients can get overnight delivery on prescriptions by calling 1-866-568-7961, Mendazona said. That number will take them to the Roseburg store, which is operated by Joshua Dahlenburg, another Sweet Home alumnus.
Land said that because the store is part of a group, the cash-flow problems caused by Medicare Part D, which was blamed for the closure of Groves and had been a problem at Home Town Drugs before it closed, won’t arise.
He and Calhoon said that “with the help of the people of Sweet Home” the group expects the volume at the store to be sufficient that it will stay financially healthy.
The new store revives the name of the old Economy Drug store, which was opened in Sweet Home by John Blanchard in 1949.
Blanchard, who originally came from LaGrande, sold the business in 1965 but returned in 1968 to become partners with Land.
“We had just built a new home in Eugene,” recalled Ruth Blanchard, John Blanchard’s widow. “Lee came down to see us and they stayed up until 4 in the morning. John always missed Sweet Home. I wanted to come back too.”
John Blanchard sold his share of the business to Dave Redden in 1982, who ran the store with Land until 1996 when Land sold his share to Redden. Land moved to Bend in 2001 because most of the other stores were in that area.
Ruth Blanchard said she was delighted to see a second pharmacy back in Sweet Home.
“The people I talk to are very upset,” she said. “They only have one option and they have to do that or go to Lebanon.”