Duane Reade’s Peculiar NYC Business Strategy: Beer on Tap?

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Next time you stop by your local pharmacy, you might be able to pick up all of your necessities including milk, shampoo, chips and a growler of beer. Yes, you read that right: A Williamsburg, Brooklyn-based Duane Reade is now offering beer on tap to its patrons.

Residents vehemently opposed the chain from entering their neighborhood because they feared that it would displace a local pharmacy, New York Times reported. So Duane Reade decided to cozy up to the naysayers by offering them something that they knew a hipster couldn’t say no to: beer on tap.

According to CBS Pittsburgh, other chains are also trying to offer “fresh” alcohol including Walmart, which has preliminary approval to put wine vending machines in select stores in Pennsylvania. Duane Reade senior vice president of merchandising and marketing Paul Tiberio said the beer is all part of their company’s efforts to customize their offerings to the neighborhood. In the Bronx, stores carry more brands of Hispanic food, and in Midtown East locations, you can find fresh-cut flowers and seasonal pies.

While you can get tastings at the Williamsburg Duane Reade – which currently nine beers on tap – sadly, you can’t sit back and enjoy a pint in store after work. It is a drugstore, after all, not a bar.