Welcome to Walgreens

Am I the only person that gets annoyed by the employees at Walgreens (and I think CVS does it too) shouting "Welcome to Walgreens" at you as you enter the store? I'm not a monster, so if somebody greets me I feel obligated to acknowledge them. And that means I have to stop doing whatever I am doing at the moment, usually talking to my wife if we are walking in together, or trying to remember why I am there in the first place.

I'm not blaming the employees. I'm sure most of them find it just as ridiculous as I do. Kind of like Target's insistence on talking me into a Target credit card every single time I enter the store. It's 2019, it seems like the register should be able to flash a "He doesn't want our damn credit card" message to the cashier after I've turned it down 20 times.

The employees know it's a bad idea, I imagine the local retail management knows it's a bad idea too. I'd be really interested in seeing the research some corporate MBA ginned up to convince the head of retail operations that interrupting every single customer that comes in the door by forcing them to acknowledge an employee was a good idea.

If Walgreens really wants to improve my customer experience I have an idea for them. My wife buys 5 vials of insulin every 30 days. They are on auto-refill so the Walgreens pharmacy system knows the order is coming way in advance. So why is it that 75% of the time, they don't have 5 vials for her, which requires us to make a second trip back to the store. It's a $2000 sale every month, like clockwork. I don't think I'm asking a lot to expect the store, especially since we have it on auto refill, to have in stock and ready for pickup when they literally have 30 days notice.

This shit is why Amazon is kicking the ass in just about every retail sector. I want to shop local, really I do, even if local in this case is a mega-corp. The prime advantage the local store has is that it can be a pleasant place to visit. So really Walgreens, make your damn stores a pleasant place to be.