Jeff Johnson raised seven kids in the West Seventh Street neighborhood, moving houses four times across 42 years, but never relocating much more than a mile from the century-old pharmacy he purchased with his wife and a business partner in 1999.
The business partner was bought out more than a decade ago, and with the Johnsons — husband-and-wife pharmacists — looking to retire this year, the couple put the West Seventh Pharmacy up for sale, including its inventory of greeting cards, angel-themed curios, toiletries and small household supplies. But facing industry headwinds that have shuttered some 44% of pharmacies in Minnesota since 2013, the Johnsons could not find a buyer.
When the doors close on the West Seventh Pharmacy on June 30, it will be for the final time. The pharmacy, in continuous operation since 1915, will cease to exist in a neighborhood that once was dotted by a number of street corner shops where a familiar face would fill a prescription while selling a customer a soda.
A sign in the West Seventh Pharmacy in St. Paul on Tuesday, May 27, 2025. Owner Jeff Johnson will retire at the end of June and shutter the 110-year-old neighborhood pharmacy. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
“It’s been a good run,” said Johnson, who has welcomed 19 grandkids into the world. “It was like ‘Mr. Rogers Neighborhood.’ We knew the mailman. We knew the bar owners. We knew the people who worked in the gas station.”
While lacking the same street corner visibility, a clinic-based pharmacy opened last year two blocks away in the Riverland Community Clinic, the former United Family Medicine center, a federally-qualified health center off West Seventh Street and Osceola and Randolph avenues. Johnson spoke with them by phone and was assured they had capacity to absorb his customers.
“I talked to them yesterday and they said they can take anybody,” Johnson said Friday.
After that, options are limited.
Fewer drug stores
There’s Etel Pharmacy within Sibley Plaza, almost three miles to the southwest, or the pharmacy within United Hospital, nearly two miles in the opposite direction, toward the outskirts of downtown St. Paul. Within downtown, there’s a pharmacy at the two-level Walgreens on Wabasha Street, which has been plagued by shoplifting.
Since 2013, 61% of independently-owned and 39% of chain pharmacies have closed, according to the Minnesota Pharmacists Association.
Some point fingers at pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) that work for managed care organizations (MCOs), who reimburse pharmacies well below their costs while instituting fees, contract terms and other market practices that leave small pharmacies at a disadvantage, according to the association.
Pharmacist Jeff Johnson, left, talks with a customer in his West Seventh Pharmacy in St. Paul on Tuesday, May 27, 2025. Johnson will retire at the end of June and shutter the 110-year-old neighborhood pharmacy. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
A handful of companies such as United Health’s Optum Rx, Cigna, CVS Caremark, and Prime Therapeutics — which works with Express Scripts — have been able to effectively dictate prices for prescription drugs using take-it-or-leave-it policies that would lock shops out if they don’t accept their terms, according to independent pharmacists.
In the past, when PBMs dictated lower prices for prescription drugs, stores could make up the difference by selling greeting cards and other items.
“Pharmacies have very little control over the pricing of the drugs themselves. (PBMs) have ratcheted everything down, so it’s gotten to the point where there’s no place to make up the losses,” said Deborah Keaveny, a Winsted, Minn. pharmacist who founded Minnesota Independent Pharmacists. “We are all at the tipping point.”
Changing landscape
Johnson noted there are other industry players who aren’t exactly skipping meals, either. “Everyone talks about the PBMs,” he said. “It could be the manufacturers. It could be the wholesalers. Larger chains could be treated differently than smaller chains. It’s as competitive as the restaurant business. It’s as competitive as the grocery business.”
A labor shortage hasn’t helped. Connie Weber, one of the two pharmacists on staff at West Seventh Pharmacy, worked for an independent pharmacy for 22 years until that shop closed. She landed at West Seventh Pharmacy five years ago. Now, another pharmacy is closing around her, which is one of several reasons younger industry peers have opted to avoid the retail sector.
“You have to pay workers a fair share, but we’re paying our workers the bare minimum,” Johnson said. “It’s a nice place to work so they accept that, but they can make more money at bigger companies.”
At West Seventh Pharmacy, what was once a dozen retail workers has now dwindled to seven part-timers, several of whom have reached retirement age themselves. Johnson’s wife, who will retire this fall from Children’s Hospital in St. Paul, jokingly refers to the West Seventh Pharmacy as the “nonprofit pharmacy.”
A customer walks into the West Seventh Pharmacy in St. Paul on Tuesday, May 27, 2025. When owner Jeff Johnson retires on June 30, the pharmacy, in continuous operation since 1915, will close for the final time. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
In addition to industry changes, customers have also changed. A younger clientele expects on-demand service akin to Amazon.com. “People treat us like McDonald’s,” Johnson said. “We have great customers, but there’s some who want things right away. That’s a hard one. There’s a difference in generations. The new customers need a little more attention.”
And to get that attention, they’ll soon have to look elsewhere.
“It’s been a good gig,” said Johnson, who is ending an era for himself and for his store. “We’ve been trying to sell it, but no one is interested in buying it.”
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