Why is Walgreens still selling tobacco products? Because people want to smoke

Amid FDA allegations that minors purchase cigarettes at its stores, Walgreens says it's not going to stop selling tobacco products at all its stores due to the negative fallout from consumers.

"We are well aware of the risk with this, but we leave it to customer choice. And if the customers choose to smoke and want to buy tobacco products in our environment, we provide that," said James Skinner, executive chairman of Walgreens Boots Alliance during a shareholder call earlier this year.

Walgreens Boots Chief Executive Stefano Pessina said that the reason the pharmacy chain isn't giving up selling cigarettes in all its stores is that "when we don't sell tobacco, we have a lot of (negative) reactions," in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.

The issue stems from a Food and Drug Administration order in February to halt the sale and distribution of tobacco products, including cigars and mental cigarettes to minors.

The agency filed complaints seeking No-Tobacco-Sale Orders (NTSO), barring certain retail locations from selling tobacco products for 30 days. The targeted outlets were a Walgreens store in Miami and a Circle K store in Charleston, South Carolina.

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The FDA said that Walgreens is the top violator among pharmacies that sell tobacco products with 22% of its 6,350 stores inspected having illegally sold tobacco products to minors.

"We have a zero-tolerance policy prohibiting the sale of tobacco products to minors, and any employee violating this policy is subject to immediate termination," Walgreens said in a statement in March.

The drugstore chain is also lowering the visibility of tobacco products in certain stores.

"Today, every Walgreens pharmacist and technician has been trained and certified on supporting a patient’s attempt to quit on their terms," Walgreens said in a statement to USA TODAY. "We also continue to focus efforts on promoting cessation products and ... support tools to patients who want to quit smoking."

Walgreens implemented a pilot program in 2018 that eliminated tobacco sales from 17 of its stores in Gainesville, Florida. The change comes nearly two years after the drugstore’s competitor CVS Health announced it would stop selling cigarettes at its stores nationwide. Walgreens executives said in January during a call with shareholders that the Gainesville test is being used to evaluate the future of tobacco sales in its stores. They also stressed they offer smoking cessation products and treatments.

During the call, some shareholders questioned Walgreens' decision to continue to sell tobacco products.

A representative of one shareholder said, "Help us to understand how the benefits of selling tobacco outweigh the risks, risks to the company's mission, to its reputation and to people's health?"

Follow Dalvin Brown on Twitter: @Dalvin_Brown

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Why is Walgreens still selling tobacco products? Because people want to smoke