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- CVS Health currently operates 10,000 pharmacies.
- At CVS, customers can refill prescriptions and buy snacks, cleaning supplies, personal care items, and more.
- The popular drugstore has amazing deals on some items, while other products are worth skipping.
- Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.
CVS is one of the most popular drugstores and pharmacies in America.
And with nearly 10,000 locations in the US, chances are you’ve passed a CVS recently.
While CVS can be a quick and convenient place to shop for basic health products and food, this convenience can come with a price. Though CVS offers great deals and even more savings for their 62 million ExtraCare members, it’s not the best place to shop for every necessity. In fact, many products that are a quick and easy grab from CVS can be found for cheaper at other drugstores, supermarkets, or large retailers like Walmart or Target.
With that in mind, here are 19 products to buy at CVS — and 19 more you should buy elsewhere.
Buy: Laundry detergent
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CVS has frequent sales on major laundry detergent brands, so make sure to take advantage of them. By combining ExtraCare rewards points with a coupon, the Krazy Coupon Lady bought a 40-ounce bottle of OxiClean for only $0.99.
Skip: Salon hair products
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Buying hair-care products at CVS or other drugstores may not get you the best bargain. In fact, they may be fueling a gray-market industry that sells counterfeit, stolen, or expired goods. This is known as diversion, and diverted products are typically more expensive and less effective than the bona fide product. Sources have even reported the presence of bacteria in diverted professional hair products.
To be safe, buy your hair products and professional shampoo at a salon. It may be at a higher price, but many salons’ anti-diversion policies protect against the gray market so you’ll know what you’re buying is authentic.
Buy: Deodorant
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CVS offers great deals on deodorant, too. With the right coupons and the right timing, deodorant brand names are typically bought for $1 or less and can even be free while shopping at CVS.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider
See Also:
- Here’s what you should buy at Aldi and what you should avoid, according to people who’ve shopped there
- I tried Dollar General’s private-label makeup line where everything costs $5 or less and found it was almost as good as Sephora
- More than 150,000 people swarmed the Mall of America when it opened 27 years ago. Here’s what the US’ biggest mall looked like back then.
SEE ALSO: 21 products you should buy on Amazon — and 22 more you should skip every time
DON’T MISS: 11 stores where you’ll probably never buy anything on sale
Source: Business Insider – feedback@businessinsider.com (Lindsey Updyke)