DEERFIELD, Ill. -- In an effort to eliminate any appearance of partisanship with the 2008 election approaching in November, the Walgreens drugstore chain's corporate offices have told their stores to remove any items that endorse political candidates, according to a report by The Detroit Free Press.
Stores selling political memorabilia such as T-shirts attempted to keep a similar amount of merchandise from each candidate on store shelves, but the task became too difficult, said the report.
"It's really hard to have them both represented and to keep a balance on shelves because one [image-nocss] sells more than the others," Walgreens spokesperson Tiffani Bruce told the newspaper. "We didn't want any appearance that we endorsed any candidate."
A collection of singing dolls depicting John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama was not included among the items that were ordered removed from shelves, but Walgreens stores in Grand Rapids chose to remove them anyway, said the report. Many stores across the country still sell the dolls, according to Bruce. The dolls are considered a novelty item, not an endorsement, she said.
Deerfield, Ill.-based Walgreens is the nation's largest drugstore chain with fiscal 2008 sales of $59 billion. The company operates 6,443 drugstores in 49 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.
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