They are locking up all the contraceptives too. I tried to buy a box of condoms when I went to pick up my prescriptions and was met with a locked cabinet where I used to just be able to grab them and add them to my order.

Just getting my scripts took 30 minutes, screw getting a guy to come out and open the thing. I got my prescriptions, left, and went to Rite Aid down the street where i could just grab them without having to look like a criminal because I wanted protection...

Yes, there's nothing more to say than the last line of that story.

walgreens also locks up the infant formula, i saw it yesterday. dunno the logic behind that one...

Ha... Yeah- Not long ago I was right by a Wal-Mart, so I went in there to get razor blades, and they have them locked up too. Pharmacy people couldn't help me and loudspeaker pages for help went unanswered so I just left.

Later in the day I bought what I wanted at Target, where NONE of that stuff is locked up.

I'm sure theft must be a problem, but when you don't have enough help to open the case, then what's the point.

I guess I'm kind of evil, but I'd probably stick some metal filings in that cabinet lock after being subjected to all that. Have fun unlocking your razor blades, CVS.

I would never entrust a chain store like CVS with developing my wedding photos. That's not the time to pinch pennies...you get what you pay for and all that...

I'm assuming that the 315 wedding photos were taken by a photographer and just handed over on a CD. Cutting corners??? Again...you get what you pay for....$50? Most people pay a lot more. I realize wedding budgets are subjective...but why trust CVS with this?? I wouldn't.

Bottom line: don't trust minimum wage morons at chain retail outlets to handle something so important!!! And write a letter to corporate.

And as for the razor blades - it's been that way at our local CVS for years. But we've never had a problem locating an employee with a key on the floor.

I'll back this person up - they have been locking up all the razors. I use that Intuition thing that couldn't cut someone if you tried - the blades are in the middle of a block of soap - and I still had to get a manager to unlock the case.

Don't let your pictures sit there! Call repeatedly until you can get the store manager, and then demand the pictures and the advertised, cheaper price.

I haven't shopped at CVS since they locked up the razor blades, either. It's a huge pain to get some apathetic cashier who resents your intrusion on his time doing jack shit to go get them for you. Trust me, buddy, I'd MUCH rather be getting these for myself.

@Falconfire: You have to get someone to pick up condoms for you? Oh no! Ahhahhha! I feel sorry for you.

I stopped going to CVS when they started the "DOYOUHAVEACVSCARD??" bull during every transaction. It annoys me that some products are labled with a price for card holders but not the "regular" price. Their circular does the same thing.

If I need to join your little club to get your best price, then, as the poster said "Fuck CVS"

heh heh
I have a feeling what kind of neighborhood this is in, but I wont elaborate...

@elislider: We wouldn't want poor mothers stealing to feed their babies. CVS knows what's up with those matronly scoundrels. Or maybe kids these days are using formula to make their crack cocaine. Ugh. CVS. Barf.

Yeah, if the razors are locked, up, they can keep their damn inventory and I'll shop somewhere else. You want to make it prohibitively difficult to buy something, don't be surprised when it doesn't sell.

As for the wedding pictures, well people here like to blame the original poster, and that's exactly what I'm going to do.. Your WEDDING picutes at CVS? Seriously? Did Papa Johns cater, and Super Fresh do the florals? As long as you're going with the lowest common denominator.

Infant formula is actually pretty expensive - theieves will steal it, and then scumbags will resell as new through bodegas - only problem is that formula may have becomes corrupted in the interim. I know it is a pain in the ass, but I can understand it.

CVS is always a Goat-Screw - avoid at all costs. And print your wedding pics somewhere where the color balance might be correct - hint, not CVS, Walgreens, Target or Walmart.

It's their prerogative to lock up stuff that's very value-dense (Mach 99 razor blades, baby formula, some electronics)-- hell, there's a reason why even high-end jewelry stores keep the goods under glass-- but it's insanely stupid to not give at least two employees per shift a key.

Some stores just don't want to make money.

I won't shop anywhere that keeps that much stuff locked up, especially places like this where it's pulling teeth to get them to unlock it for you. If they don't want to sell it to me, then I'll just buy it elsewhere.

I hate CVS as well.
The other day, I was really really ill. Almost to the point of passing out. And I felt like I was either going to shit my pants or throw up any second. I go to buy some flu medication. (I was not going to take any medication, but my girlfriend got sick before I did, and I was going to get it for her) The girl pesters me about showing my drivers license to buy one little overpriced package. And the one I bought had no pseudoephedrine . So there was no reason to check my ID. As if I was going to go make some meth from the twelve little tablets in the box. Absolutely ridiclous. I am tired of being treated like a criminal.

I have started getting proactive at these poor customer service locations. At Wal Mart when I could not find anyone in the sporting goods to open a locked cabinet I finally went over to the counter, leaned over, and sure enough there were the display keys sitting there. I used them to open the cabinet. Then a shocked sales person comes up and asks me what I am doing with the keys. I told him since no one would help me I just figured it must be self service, but if he would like to help me that would be great!

Might be helpful if we knew which CVS this was. It sounds like it's worth avoiding or at least acknowledging corporate that there's a CVS that isn't "Customer Valued Service"...

@MissTic: Don't pass judgment on how she gets her wedding pictures done. Some people don't need to be gouged to feel satisfied and like they are keeping up with the Joneses. If she's happy with how they would have processed them, why would you object to that? Nothing was destroyed here; the only consequence was inconvenience and irritation. There's no reason for this to be a cautionary tale about buying into the wedding-industrial complex.

@elislider: Actually, for a while (don't know if this is still going on), there were actually organized shoplifting rings that would steal baby forumla... cases and cases of the stuff was disappearing. The stuff is pretty expensive, and apparently easy to sell on the black market... Google for "Baby formula theft" for the gory details.

My local grocery store has just a few cans on the shelf, with instructions to ask at customer service if the shelf is empty.

Razor blades are also quite expensive and easy to steal, so it kind of makes sense to at least have them behind the counter, but yeah, they then need to make it easy to get to them.

Putting condoms behind the counter though? Yeah, I'd take my business elsewhere for that one. Even if shoplifting is a problem, I am REALLY not going to bother with trying to get those from some clerk with Hyperactive Morality Disorder.

SirWired

@MissTic: How badly could CVS screw up her photos? She has a digital copy. If the photos suck she can have them reprinted, or according to your logic she can spend tons of money just in case CVS' photo printer isn't very good.

@MissTic: No one knows why Rachael is printing out wedding photos at CVS. Half a dozen good reasons come to mind immediately. It shouldn't matter for the purposes of this story.

The CVS by me has the razors locked up, btu there is a little thingy below each one that you push and one gets dispensed to you. It was hard to see, but it was there. Also, my father works for a grocery chain and says that infant formula is one item that has a very high theft rate. He says that people come in and can walk out with cases if they are not watching. Apparently this is one way to get your kids fed...

Can we please ease up on the original poster about having her wedding photos developed at CVS? That's not the point here, the point is the mind-boggling bad non-service provided by the store. To those who are insulting the OP about having wedding photos developed at CVS, they were never specific about what "type" of photos they were. (For example, the photos could be a collection from all different guests' digital shots - perhaps the OP asked guests to send her their digital shots to get a range of "non-formal" pictures of the reception.)

This post is about the suckiness of CVS, which I can fully endorse.

I haven't set foot inside a CVS since Walgreens opened near me. They were great, when they were Revco, but they've sucked ever since.

@syndprod: Exactly! @MissTic: What syndprod said. I wouldn't trust CVS as the ONLY way of getting my photography done, but we don't know the full extent of her needs. I know my photographer is going to give us a CD of prints, in addition to a few select ones we choose to have framed. We intend to get prints from shutterfly so we can include them with our thank you cards, and those will be around $.15 each. I'd recommend to the OP that she uses shutterfly or photoworks.

i wouldnt pass judgement on the wedding photos either - we are paying over $2000 for ours, yet we are only getting a few prints, and i will print the rest that i want on my own - why pay for every picture they take when i may only want certain ones?

I've ALWAYS had excelent prints when I've had the developed at CVS. And I develope prints almost weekly.

I have never had a problem with CVS and have used them on both coasts. Customer service is not good in general in the area where I live and I have never experienced this bad of service. I would e-mail the home office and let them know. I do not think this is how CVS usually runs things.

I was in a Walgreens here in Southeast Michigan when I wanted to buy a five pack of Bic lighters. I was told I needed to show ID, and I'm 45 years old.

@CaptainConsumer: For lighters? Awesome.

Our local CVS has some of that locked too....as for the photos, for a few $50.00's you can buy a nice photo-printer yourself and do them at home at your lesiure. (local self-employed owner plug: If the photog did a nice job at your wedding, buy a few pic's from him anyway...dont be too cheap a cheapskate! You may want him if you have a marriage #2...)

@Dashrashi: Nice assumption. But WRONG. I simply said I wouldn't trust something so important to a place like CVS. I also said wedding budgets are subjective. Additonally, there isn't enough info about the situation to pass any further judgements - nice try though. I'd stick with a store that's known for their customer service and film quality. Not all photo development machines/technicans are created equal. That could be another retail chain store or it could be a camera shop that specializes in photo development. Clearly, your wallet dictates where you shop but my point was that you get what you pay for. These weren't just random photos, these were wedding photos. Something you'd think would merit a bit more importance. Again, we don't know her situation. Maybe she's used CVS without incident and logically assumed it would be fine.

Yes, digital photos and image processing have come a long way...but some things are better left to the pros and not a key mashing monkey at CVS who can't be bothered to stop yakking on her cell phone. Film quality aside....

We are not even getting prints for our photos. Just 4-5 CDs full of the shots. Granted we are only paying like 700 dollars for it but its much cheaper than our friends who have spent upwards of 4000 dollars for what most likely are getting printed at something only slightly better than the system CVS uses.

Its all automatic these days, even wide format photos are printed via a machine and checked up by a lab tech. Even at that they are almost never printed on actual light sensitive papers, and are almost always a ultra-high quality printer.

What drives me nuts is being treated like a criminal when I want to buy cold meds--like Sudafed.

As others have said (and my wife who used to work at a CVS in a fairly seedy urban locale) razor blades and baby formula have high theft rates. I have found that more and more stores in my area (towns adjacent to the fairly seedy urban locale) have been locking things like this up as the denizens of the fairly seedy urban locale keep searching for easy sources that are still close enough to get to easily.

That doesn't excuse the lack of keys or the apathy of the people working there, of course.

Regarding the one-hour pricing, this has always been a pet peeve of mine and one that I feel should fall afoul of advertising laws. Rarely can a "One hour" processor get your prints done in an hour. It really just means same day.

BTW, I'm not going to pass judgement on where you get the prints, but if you are getting 315 prints you probably could have got them done elsewhere for less.

@MissTic: Who do you think prints for the pro's?

You should check the back of a photography magazine, you will open your eyes to the world of photography and how hardly anyone actually does printmaking in house, if at all.

Its not the same ballgame as it was even 15 years ago.

I would trust walmart before I would trust CVS.

I don't even trust CVS for toilet paper.

@RobinB: I totally agree with you, because if your nose is running, like, ohmygod, hand over the sudafed for god's sake, but I read this Rolling Stone article (...I know), and it turns out the little individual blister packs really are a part of the meth problem, which is really a big problem nationally. So I'm conflicted. I wish they would make the hoops just slightly easier for us to jump through. Maybe have them next to the cigarettes instead of behind the pharmacy counter, so you can get them even when the pharmacy is closed. Perhaps show ID, or make you sign for them, but...don't be such jerks about it? I don't know.

@MissTic: Reminds me of the time that I picked up some pictures from CVS and had someone's honeymoon pictures and negatives in the envelope along with my pictures. Weird thing was that I had just placed the order at the kiosk from my digital camera, didn't have film so had no reason to have negatives. To top it all off, the honeymoon pic's weren't as interesting as I had hoped - so I returned them.

Actually, me and my wife had a few of our pictures re-printed at CVS. She uploaded the digital files to CVS.com and then we picked them up a couple hours later (we could have gone after an hour, but as the CVS is across the street we picked them up when we went out on other errands). The prints were pretty good quality (8 x 10's) and the price was cheap.
I don't see why people are ragging on getting prints there, yeah the service at this location is overall horrible, but I don't see the need for all the crap about getting prints from CVS.

My local CVS has a loud prisoner-has-escaped announcement every time someone wants to buy razors: "a customer needs assistance at men's razors" over and over and over in a sci-fi voice. It won't stop until an employee goes and gets them and turns it off. It's extremely annoying for ALL shoppers but effective for the one shopper. I can't wait until they do that with condoms too - sort of amusing?

@MissTic: If the prints don't turn out it's not a big deal when we're talking digital images which can very easily be taken to another shop for printing.

CVS cards me when I buy Nicoderm CQ patches. Good thing I'm old enough to quit smoking.

@friendlynerd: I know your being a ass... but some people cant breastfeed at all for reasons OTHER than being high or drunk.

I was allergic to breast milk, and some women are on some hardcore prescriptions that make their milk unsuitable.

@bdgbill: You know what's funny about that? Every time I go to CVS they ask if I have a card and I say "no". So the cashier just grabs one from the pile by the register, scans it and says something like "you saved $1.14". It's like they don't even care...

@RobinB: No kidding. I'm standing there, obviously sick, coughing and hacking, and does the guy just hand me the meds and say "hope you feel better soon"? Hell no. "I need your ID, firstborn, oh you don't have any kids? I need your inheritance, fingerprint, retinal scan, DNA..."

Just give me the freakin' meds before I pass out right here!

As for experience #1, I would have been out of there after seeing how long the first line was. I don't need razor blades that badly, thanks. If retail customers don't vote with their feet, how can they expect good service? People who are willing to go through what Rachael went through just to make a simple purchase are telling stor