Walgreens Boots Alliance considering a buyout?

Early in the week, Reuters and news agencies reported that Walgreens Boots Alliance is kicking around the idea of going private, holding conversations with private equity firms to consider what would be the largest leveraged buyout in history, per the Reuters story. Walgreens’ market capitalization is more than $50 billion.

The Deerfield, Ill.-based company operates Walgreens, Duane Reade and UK-based Boots. While the company reported last month that overall sales have increased by 4.1%, year-over-year, front-end store sales are down for the fourth straight year, dropping 2.4%, equal to its drop a year ago.

In a Store Brands interview in June, Helayna Minks, group vice president of retail brands at Walgreens, said the retailer is going to be ambitious about inventing and building up its own brands. Walgreens currently offers several thousand store brand SKUs, driven by its health and wellness private products totaling around 2,200.

Walgreens also recently partnered with Kroger, running a test in various stores in Tennessee where Kroger locations are carrying Walgreens’ own brands.