After decades in business, Rite Aid makes a major move amid bankruptcy

(NEW YORK) — Rite Aid has shuttered all of its stores after more than six decades in business.

The pharmacy chain made the announcement in a post on its website, stating, “All Rite Aid stores have now closed. We thank our loyal customers for their many years of support.”

ABC News has reached out to the company for comment, but did not immediately hear back.

Despite its long history in the pharmacy industry, Rite Aid has faced mounting financial challenges in recent years. The company most recently filed for bankruptcy protection in May, just eight months after emerging from a previous Chapter 11 filing in September 2024.

At the time, Rite Aid — which operated more than 1,200 stores across 15 states from California to Vermont — said it planned to keep stores open while selling off assets to avoid disrupting customers’ prescription services.

The company also announced it had secured $1.94 billion in new financing from existing lenders to stay operational during bankruptcy proceedings.

Rite Aid had first filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October 2023, allowing it to reduce billions in debt and close hundreds of underperforming stores. Alongside declining sales, the company has also faced more than 1,000 federal, state, and local lawsuits alleging its pharmacies improperly filled prescriptions for painkillers, according to the New York Times.

In March 2023, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a complaint accusing Rite Aid of filling “unlawful prescriptions for controlled substances” that showed multiple red flags for misuse — allegations the company has denied.

As part of its first bankruptcy reorganization, Rite Aid reached a settlement with the Justice Department in June 2024 resolving those allegations under the False Claims Act and Controlled Substances Act. Under the settlement, the company agreed to pay the government $7.5 million and have a general unsecured claim in Rite Aid’s bankruptcy case, which are being handled through the court process. Rite Aid did not admit to any wrongdoing.

The company’s second bankruptcy filing in May 2025 paused most of the remaining opioid-related lawsuits including cases brought by state and local governments as well as individual plaintiffs which are now being handled through the bankruptcy’s claims process while Rite Aid works through its wind-down plan — a plan that remains under court review amid ongoing objections from the U.S. Trustee.

Rite Aid has denied the allegations in those lawsuits and in a statement in 2023 said it sought an “equitable” resolution of opioid claims through the Chapter 11 process.

Founded in 1962 as Thrift D Discount Center in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Rite Aid grew into the nation’s third-largest standalone pharmacy chain before its final closure.