Inside Daniel’s Pharmacy in the Excelsior, pharmacist Steve Protzels, Pharm. D. stands behind the counter, greeting customers by name.

The small shop hums with movement: deliveries being packed, phones ringing, and regulars picking up prescriptions. In a city where neighborhood pharmacies, both independent and chain locations, keep disappearing, Daniel’s still feels like a place where people actually know you.

Daniel’s Pharmacy has been part of the neighborhood for decades, run by a family deeply rooted in San Francisco. Protzels has worked here for 11 years but has spent over 50 in the field.

Before joining Daniel’s, he managed other pharmacies, including Safeway and Westward. But the difference, he says, is freedom.

“Here, you can actually make professional judgments. At a chain, there’s always a big brother watching.”

That freedom lets him focus on what matters most: the people. When a customer comes in confused about eye drops, Protzels doesn’t just point, he steps out from behind the counter to help.

“It’s all about customer service,” he said. “We go out of our way to make accommodations that people might not get in other places.”

For Ed Nasrah ’84, one of the family owners, the mission is personal.

“We grew up in this neighborhood…Everybody feels like family. We’re the first stop for people before the doctor. It’s satisfying knowing we can help someone before a health problem gets worse,” Nasrah said.

Nearly 70 percent of their 300–400 daily prescriptions are delivered across the Bay Area, to homes, hospitals, and senior centers.

Still, staying independent isn’t easy. Financial pressures, low reimbursement rates, and middlemen called pharmacy-benefit managers, who work between drug companies and pharmacies to set and manage medication costs for insurers, threaten small operations like Daniel’s by taking too big of a cut for themselves.

“Money is the driving factor,” he said. “If you have financial problems from any angle, it’s bad.” He worries that independent pharmacies may become “a thing of the past,” especially as big chains shuffle pharmacists around as “floaters,” making it impossible for customers to form relationships with their caregivers.

But for customers like Mike McElligott ’68, Daniel’s is irreplaceable. “They treat you like an individual here, not just a number…So many pharmacies are caught up in greed. These guys are just doing the right things.”

For McElligott, the relationship is personal, even vital.

“If I mess up one medication, I could die,” he said. “They look at every prescription to make sure nothing cancels the others out. They’re tremendous.” He smiled, adding, “Every time I walk in here, someone helps me out with something. They really treat you like family.”

After 50 years in pharmacy work, Protzels still laughs at the idea of slowing down. “Only been doing this for 50 years,” he said with a grin. “So I’m just getting started.”

Daniel’s Pharmacy may not be flashy like a chain store, but that’s exactly the point. It’s not just a business on the corner – it’s a reminder that care, trust, and community can still fit behind a small counter in San Francisco.