The Green Bay, Wisc.-based retail chain announced this week it was closing more than 100 stores across the Midwest and West, including three in western Idaho and 13 in Utah. But the Idaho Falls store, at 800 East 17th Street, and its store in Pocatello, both of which date back to the mid-1980s, were not on the list of stores closing as part of the company's restructuring under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. (Link: http://info.shopko.com/closing-locations.pdf)
The stores remaining open are to be sold through a court-supervised auction process. Company spokeswoman Michelle Hansen said Thursday the retailer is exiting the pharmacy business and has already sold many of its pharmacies to Kroger, CVS and other buyers. The Idaho Falls and Pocatello locations were not included on the list of ShopKo pharmacies that have already changed hands.
Hansen said the pharmacies should remain open under Shopko until a buyer emerges. She said Shopko will post updates at http://info.shopko.com. She said Shopko will notify customers when a pharmacy will close and to where their prescriptions have been transferred.
Founded by a pharmacist in 1962, ShopKo went public in 1991. It was purchased by Sun Capital Partners, a private-equity firm, for about $1.1 billion in 2005. The company has operated 363 stores in 24 states, according to its website, and operates a regional distribution center on Gowen Road near Interstate 84 in southeast Boise.
"This decision is a difficult, but necessary one," Russ Steinhorst, Shopko's CEO, said in a press statement. "In a challenging retail environment, we have had to make some very tough choices, but we are confident that by operating a smaller and more focused store footprint, we will be able to build a stronger ShopKo that will better serve our customers, vendors, employees and other stakeholders through this process."
