Former Longs Drugs Flagship Store Doomed

[Alpha8472]

The former Longs Drugs Flagship store in downtown Walnut Creek, California seems like it is doomed to be demolished. The entire area is part of a massive redevelopment plan that involves new office buildings, condos, and retail shops on the ground floors.

The huge building spree will take several years to even approve, but the huge parking lot of the former flagship store, which is now a CVS, will be used for mixed retail and office use.

Downtown Walnut Creek has limited space to expand these days, except for that particularly huge and mostly empty parking lot. The city wants that land to build their monstrous office buildings and condos. That part of Walnut Creek is often what people see when they get off the freeway. It is an area of unsightly parking lots and ugly old buildings.

The parking lot of the current CVS is much larger than the parking lot of even the Safeway store in downtown Walnut Creek. Longs Drugs planned well when they opened up their flagship store decades ago. They wanted customers to have tons of parking spaces for their large store.

When CVS took over Longs Drugs, CVS destroyed the old Longs Drugs decor. They raised prices and got rid of most of the employees of the store. Customers hated the changes and the once very busy store became a ghost town. CVS should just close the store now. They only get a fraction of the business that Longs Drugs once had. CVS has already closed down their Pleasant Hill store one city over. A new Safeway store with a pharmacy put that CVS out of business after only a few weeks.

There are rumors that a new supermarket might be planned for the area now occupied by the CVS in Walnut Creek. It would probably an urban supermarket with a supermarket on the ground floor and several stories of condos on top. I don't know which supermarket chain would operate such a supermarket. Safeway has experience building new stores like that in urban areas. However, Safeway already has a tiny supermarket in downtown. That store is one that Safeway has always wanted to replace due to its limited size and tiny parking lot. You can never find parking and the limited floor space has little room for a full selection of products.

[storewanderer]

That also sounds like it means the end for that deli next to it.

[Alpha8472]

Genova's Delicatessen has been an iconic part of Walnut Creek for many years. People travel from miles around to go there. I hope they find another place to move to. However, the downtown area has such high rent that Genova's may simply close down that location for good. There is another very small Genova's in Walnut Creek. Oddly enough, it is next to another former Longs Drugs (now CVS) in Walnut Creek.