"The new Duane Reade on Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg is hardly the plain, sometimes dingy New York City drugstore chain that many of us have come to know when buying toothpaste, aspirin, or pretzels. Like an increasing number of Duane Reades around the city, gone is the boring, yet somehow tasteful red, white, and blue sign with the Rx mixing bowl emblem inviting you into a fluorescent-lit drugstore with an enhanced selection of snacks. Instead one now sees frontage emblazoned with signs and graphics most likely described as “fresh,” “cool,” or even “jazzy...”'
http://www.brooklynrail.org/2011/02/local/ruminations-on-duane-reade