Walgreens Opens

The long-awaited Walgreens opened in Norfolk Center late this week. The approximately 9,000-square-foot store at 3 Liberty Lane just west of Town Hall is Norfolk’s drug store since independently owned Norfolk Pharmacy closed in March 1997.

Views of the exterior and the interior of the new Walgreens store, which opened in Norfolk Center late this week. The store is the first commercial building to open in Norfolk Commons. Photo by Matt McDonald Some Norfolk residents have had to drive 12 minutes or so to get to drug stores in Medfield, Millis, Franklin, or Walpole. The new Walgreens held an open house from 4 to 8 p.m. this past Thurs­day, followed by an official opening at 8 a.m. Friday. “It’s really nice to see people really happy about us being open,” said store manager Brian Simon in an interview Friday morning. “… They seemed excit­ed about it, which is good.” The store’s hours are 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day of the week. The pharma­cy’s hours are 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Satur­day, and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday. The brightly lit store has a squeaky-clean floor. The pharmacy has a drive-thru, which Simon hopes commuters will take ad­vantage of by dropping off prescriptions in the morning on their way to work and picking them up on the way home.

Alyssa Mills, the store’s pharmacy manager, said Town Hall employees told her they had been watching progress on the store building for months, but that when they saw a bread truck make a de­livery recently they knew the store was close to opening.

The store is the first com­mercial building to open in Norfolk Commons, which is theoretically supposed to include a supermarket.

Another commercial building just west of the Walgreens is also just about ready for occupancy, but has no tenants.