For Little Neck Drug Store, the Prescription is Personal

Chandra Gajulapalli takes his business personally.

Which is probably why, as the owner and head pharmacist of , he still has a business at all. Gajulapalli brings to his pharmacy what the corporate-owned competition cannot: a dose of familiarity.

“We know our customers on a one-on-one basis, by their names,” he said. “We try to help them on a personal level.”

The desire to better connect with customers is what initially drove Gajulapalli to quit his job in the pharmacy of a major chain, deciding instead that if he wanted things done his way, he’d have to start fresh on his own.

That was 10 years ago. Today, despite the presence of a CVS and that loom within spitting distance, Gajulapalli is confident that his willingness to go the extra mile for his customers—roughly 95 percent of whom are regulars—will keep him afloat.

“With chains...if somebody’s short a dollar, you can’t just say ‘OK, you can come back tomorrow and pay for it,’ even though you know the customer. But here, you know, you can pay me later, no big deal.”

That customers prefer a personal experience is not lost on the nation’s chains. By adopting taglines like “Your City. Your Drugstore,” retailers like Duane Reade attempt to convey their own small-business ethos – never mind that Duane Reade is owned by Walgreens, the largest pharmacy chain in the United States.  Even big-box archetype Walmart is opening Lilliputian versions of its typically acres-large megastores.  

Regardless of these efforts, Gajulapalli said it's easy for customers to distinguish the difference, particularly when it comes to the person handling their prescriptions.

"They’re employees," he said of chain pharmacists. “It’s a 9 to 5 job kind of thing. You just come, do your prescriptions and go home.”

But businesses like Little Neck Drug Store are quickly becoming an endangered species in an increasingly chain-laden landscape. A darkened , once a bustling cornerstone of Little Neck economic life, sits only a few doors down, a stark reminder to local businesses that if it can go, they can too.

Gajulapalli isn’t naïve to the hardships of maintaining a small business. His store's original site was at 254-41 Horace Harding Expressway, which regulars to Little Neck Plaza now know as . Gajulapalli was forced from the area five years ago after property manager KimCo Realty refused to renew his lease, preferring instead to populate the mall with chains (the latest addition is , which replaced .)

Gajulapalli was able to find his current space at 252-11 Northern Blvd., this time signing a lease for 15 years. But some of his former neighbors weren’t so lucky. Failing to find a new location after KimCo took over, a greeting card store next door was forced to shutter after 30 years in business.

But Little Neck Drug Store seems to have successfully established its place in the world. Gajulapalli said that while he’s aware of the larger drug stores that border his own, he’s able to coexist with them.

“We have a kind of harmony, I guess,” he said. “Their customers are their customers, my customers are my customers.”

You can find more articles from this ongoing series, “Dispatches: The Changing Amerian Dream” from across the country at The Huffington Post.