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KEYSVILLE – The new Walgreens drive-thru pharmacy is now open.

The new location opened last month and will focus more on health and wellness products, said Corporate Communications and Media Relations official Kris Lathan.

However, if you’re looking to pick up your prescriptions on the weekend, you will have to wait as the store is closed on the weekends.

“Store hours are Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and it is closed on weekends,” Lathan said. These store hours have been in place for more than a year, as we have at times had to adjust store or pharmacy hours at some of our locations as we work to balance staffing and resources to meet our patient and customer demand best.”

Lathan said adjusted store hours are reflected on the Walgreens store locator, which is updated throughout the day and on the Walgreens mobile app. “Patients who have questions about their medications can also talk to a Walgreens pharmacist using the Pharmacist Video Chat feature, which is available 24/7 on Walgreens.com as well as the Walgreens mobile app,” she added.

According to Lathan, the store still has a retail section and a complete pharmacy with a drive-thru. However, the front-end retail section is smaller than the traditional store layout.

Lathan said Walgreens hopes to return to regular operating hours soon.

“Staffing challenges have impacted retailers, healthcare entities and countless other industries over the past 12+ months,” she said. “We’ve continued to take proactive steps to address staffing needs, including hiring thousands of pharmacists and other team members, increasing compensation and other measures to reduce workload while creating a differentiated working environment. We have seen positive staffing trends for the past several months as we work to return more stores to normal operating hours.”

Keysville Mayor Steven Morris said he was “not overwhelmingly happy with the new hours.”

In an interview last summer, Morris also said Walgreen corporate officials noted that the old store location in the Food Lion Shipping Center in Keysville was not meeting its corporate profit percentage.

According to Morris, “That percentage would be on $5.26 million Walgreens grossed in Keysville last year,” Morris said. “Also, the new building will be 70% smaller than the space they currently occupy and rent, reducing the number of inventory available now.”