CVS, the second-largest drugstore chain in America, is kicking the tobacco habit.
The company announced Wednesday it will phase out sales of cigarettes, cigars and chewing tobacco at its 7,600 US stores by Oct. 1.
The move was cheered by President Obama, a former smoker, and it put pressure on CVS’s rivals to follow suit.
It also marked another shift in the evolution of drugstores.
Over the past half-century, they’ve morphed into convenience shops selling household products, snack food, cigarettes, beer and other items besides prescription drugs, vitamins and headache cures.
But the stores are now becoming health-care providers that offer flu shots and treat minor ailments in walk-in clinics.
CVS said that when approaching doctors and hospital groups as part of its expansion, it found tobacco was a major liability.
“One of the first questions they ask us is, ‘Well, if you’re going to be part of the health-care system, how can you continue to sell tobacco products?’ ” CVS chief medical officer Dr. Troyen Brennan said.
‘There’s really no good answer to that at all.”
“Put simply, the sale of tobacco products is inconsistent with our purpose,” added the company’s CEO, Larry Merlo.
Obama said he hoped CVS’s move was the start of a trend.
“As one of the largest retailers and pharmacies in America, CVS Caremark sets a powerful example,” the president said.
The nation’s largest pharmacy chain — Walgreens, which owns Duane Reade — said it has been evaluating its own tobacco sales for “some time” and would continue to do so.
Rite-Aid, the No. 3 chain, said it “continually” looks at whether its offerings meet “the needs and interests of its customers.”
CVS is the first major drugstore chain to ban all tobacco products. But some major retailers, such as Target, had previously dropped cigarettes. Only 4 percent of cigarette sales are in drugstores.
The policy change is another victory by anti-smoking forces, who had already convinced San Francisco, Boston and some other cities to bar tobacco sales in pharmacies.
Kicking the tobacco habit will cost CVS about $2 billion in revenue a year, the company estimated. That’s less than 2 percent of the $123 billion in revenue CVS registered in 2012.
Only 18 percent of Americans smoke today, compared with 42 percent around the time of the landmark 1964 surgeon general’s report that proved the connection between lung cancer and cigarettes.
With Wires
CVS also sells beer and will continue to do so.
Industry analysts said CVS’s decision to get rid of tobacco is also a reaction to a declining market.