Thrifty PayLess

Infobox_Defunct_Company
company_name = Thrifty PayLess Holdings, Inc.
company_
company_type = Retail/Pharmacy
foundation = 1919
defunct = 1998
fate = Acquired by Rite Aid
location = Los Angeles, California
industry = Retail
products = Pharmacy, Liquor, Cosmetics, Health and Beauty Aids, General Merchandise, Snacks, 1 Hour Photo
homepage = None

Thrifty PayLess Holdings, Inc. was a pharmacy holding company that owned the Thrifty Drugs and PayLess Drug Store chains in the western United States.

The combined company was formed in April 1994 when Los Angeles-based TCH Corporation, the parent company of Thrifty Corporation and Thrifty Drug Stores, Inc., acquired the Kmart subsidiary PayLess Northwest, Inc.

At the time of the merger, TCH Corporation was renamed Thrifty PayLess Holdings, Inc. and Thrifty operated 495 stores, PayLess operated 543 stores.

In 1998, Rite Aid acquired and the 1,000-store west coast chain's owner Thrifty PayLess Holdings re-branded it as Rite Aid, creating a chain with over 3,500 drug stores.

History of PayLess

Peyton Hawes and William Armitage acquired a controlling interest in five drug stores in three communities in Oregon and Washington, which were named PayLess, and grew their chain through both acquisition and internal expansion. By 1984 PayLess Drug Stores was the largest independently owned and operated drug store chain in the United States. It became a wholly owned unit of Kmart in 1985, as part of the Kmart expansion program created by CEO Joseph Antonini. In 1986, there were 225 PayLess stores. Between 1986 and 1988, it attempted a strategy of creating PayLess Wonder World stores in select Kmart, Value Giant, and former TG&Y locations in Texas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico; these stores lacked pharmacies at first, but included other sundries at discount prices. The PayLess Wonder World chain peaked at 16 stores, and they were eventually reverted back to PayLess stores. By 1990 PayLess operated in nine western states. Today, a new Payless Drugs, (using a similar logo to the prior PayLess), operates as a long-term healthcare pharmacy but does not operate retail stores.

Acquisitions

* 1973 - Acquired Seattle based House of Values and Portland owned Gov-Mart Bazaar to form Pay Less/House of Values.
* 1976 - PayLess bought 22 Value Giant stores, the majority of which were located in Northern California.
* 1980 - PayLess acquired PayLess Drug Stores of Oakland, California, founded by Levi Justin Skaggs.
* 1987 - PayLess purchased 25 Osco Drug stores in Washington and Idaho.
* 1990 - Acquired Pay Less of Tacoma.

History of Thrifty

In 1919, brothers Harry and Robert Borun, with brother-in-law Norman Levin founded Borun Brothers a Los Angeles, California drug wholesaler. In 1929, they opened their own retail outlets under the name Thrifty Cut Rate in Los Angeles, California.

By 1942, Thrifty Drug Stores had 58 stores.

During the 1950s, a Thrifty commercial jingle was heard on numerous radio stations in Southern California:

"Save a nickel, save a dime.
Save at Thrifty every time.
Save a dollar and much more,
at your Thrifty Drug and Discount Store!"

Until the early 1980s, every Thrifty store featured a tube tester, usually located near the cosmetics display case. There was still a wide variety of tube-type and hybrid tube/transistor consumer electronics in use, and the local Thrifty store was a convenient place to test TV and radio tubes and purchase replacements. Thrifty also published a brochure which showed various malfunctioning TV presentations and suggested which section's tube or tubes might be the problem. The brochure also provided numbered stickers to aid consumers in making sure that the good tubes went back into the same sockets in their equipment.

By the late-1980s, Thrifty Drug stores acquired Pay 'n Save, Sportswest stores (converted to Big 5), Bi-Mart, and Price Savers Wholesale Club warehouses from the Pay 'n Save corporation.

In Washington State, Thrifty went by the name of Giant T since the Thrifty name was in use by another chain of drug stores. The name was later changed to Thrifty in 1984. Later all Thrifty stores in Washington state were renamed to Pay 'n Save after the acquisition.

The Thrifty name and logo live on at Rite Aid, as Thrifty Ice Cream is still sold in the West Coast Rite Aid locations, both by the half-gallon carton and by the famous single, double or triple dip cone. The Thrifty brand of ice cream was retained because it had won several important awards in its history. Thrifty Ice Cream is also sold at ice cream shops around California. In March 2008, Thrifty Ice Cream changed their packaging from the simple interlocking-flap waxed paper carton to a more sophisticated lidded carton which is sealed at the bottom. The new packaging includes about an ounce of non-recyclable plastic per carton.Lopsided|date=July 2008 The ice cream is manufactured at the Thrifty creamery in El Monte, California.

In popular culture

* Thrifty and its ice cream are referenced in the song "Playdough!" by The Aquabats.
* Many people used to get the name confused with Payless ShoeSource. PayLess Drug Stores had the name registered first in each of the states it operated in, forcing Payless Shoe Source to operate under the name "Volume Shoes". Once PayLess Drug was purchased by Rite-Aid, Payless Shoe Source was able to convert its existing Volume stores into Payless stores.
* On "The Late Show with David Letterman," actor Robert Downey Jr revealed that he had worked at the store as a teenager, and admitted that he and his friends had been running a "grifter scam" and were selling items to their friends at significantly lowered prices (such as a lawn mower for eighteen cents). [cite web|url = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQgmt0TRri4|title =YouTube|date = April 2008|author = YouTube.com |publisher = YouTube: Equator Initiative]

PayLess of Tacoma

A separate chain of drug stores was operating in Tacoma using the Pay Less name. These stores operated in the counties of Pierce, Kitsap, and Thurston counties in Washington state. Pay Less Northwest would rename their stores operating in those counties as House Of Values. Later the name was changed to Value Giant.

In 1990 PayLess of Tacoma filed for bankruptcy. It was acquired by Thrifty Payless shortly after the filing.

Arizona Thrifty PayLess

A separate and probably unrelated chain going by the name Thrifty-Payless was founded in Arizona by Allen Rosenberg in 1934. This self-service drug stores was sold in 1942 to L.L. Skaggs Payless drug store chain that later became Osco Drug in 1981. Rosenberg went on to be a philanthropist helping to establish Phoenix Children's Hospital.

External links

* [http://www.paylessdrug.com/content_down.asp?p=home Payless Drugs homepage]
* [http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/Thrifty-PayLess-Inc-Company-History.html History of Thrifty PayLess] (prior to acquisition by Rite Aid)

References

* [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3092/is_v23/ai_3359900 Pay Less to jump $1 billion sales hurdle in 1984 Discount Store News, July 23, 1984]
* [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3092/is_n15_v27/ai_6513200 Pay Less changes mix, closes Wonder World units - Annual Industry Report, part 2 Discount Store News, July 18, 1988]
* [http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/stories/2001/05/14/newscolumn2.html Completion of new children's hospital delayed The Business Journal of Phoenix - May 11, 2001 by Angela Gonzales]
* [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3374/is_n8_v19/ai_19374390 Thrifty PayLess. Drug Store News, April 28, 1997]