HI, any Independent owners ready to give the advice & steps to start a new pharmacy. Thanks in advance.

[chakkara]

HI, any Independent owners ready to give the advice & steps to start a new pharmacy. Thanks in advance.

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[BenJammin]

Everyone is going to nickel and dime you. Meet folks about NCPA and go from there. Don't join twitter lists, facebook groups, or any of that crap.

 

[Sabril]

1) Hire a desperate recent grad for $25/hr
2) Pay yourself a good salary and stay home
3) Occasionally call into your pharmacy and complain about how the business is sinking
4) Profit

 

[PromisedNeverland]

Don't

Unless he wants to lose money, then go right ahead

 

[mentos]

1) Hire a desperate recent grad for $25/hr
2) Pay yourself a good salary and stay home
3) Occasionally call into your pharmacy and complain about how the business is sinking
4) Profit

Rule no 1 of Shark Tank, don't pay yourself any salary.

 

[johnpharm01]

HI, any Independent owners ready to give the advice & steps to start a new pharmacy. Thanks in advance.

Buy an existing pharmacy.
Base staffing on volume
Connect it with a clinic if possible.
Offer similar hours and service as competitor.
Manage your inventory well
Don't do anything shady to make money
Have strong relations with local providers
Don't have a front end if possible
There is still money out there
Contract with insurers

 

[southpharmindy]

Go work at a successful independent and learn even if you'll make less than working for a chain. Save your money. Whatever you do don't go out on a blind limb.

 

[mentos]

Buy an existing pharmacy.
Base staffing on volume
Connect it with a clinic if possible.
Offer similar hours and service as competitor.
Manage your inventory well
Don't do anything shady to make money
Have strong relations with local providers
Don't have a front end if possible
There is still money out there
Contract with insurers

What's wrong with a front end?

 

[johnpharm01]

What's wrong with a front end?

Costs money to run without making money, learned it from the owner of an independent I worked at

 

[mentos]

Costs money to run without making money, learned it from the owner of an independent I worked at

What about just candy, soda and junk food? Everyone impulse buys those.

 

[johnpharm01]

What about just candy, soda and junk food? Everyone impulse buys those.

They also take up space, require an employee to ring it out. Others may have another opinion but that's my experience

 

[mentos]

They also take up space, require an employee to ring it out. Others may have another opinion but that's my experience

What else will you put under the counter? A soda fridge takes up like a 2ftx3ft footprint? I'm genuinely curious because just about every store in the world has these things by the register.

 

[owlegrad]

“Require an employee to ring it out” - just like everything they sell, including prescriptions?

Or you could have vending machines I guess.

 

[johnpharm01]

I have worked in different indys. The owner of one credited their success to no front end and sold only rxs.

The other sold front end stuff including sodas. Stopping production to ring out a soda is a pita. Front end requires more work as well. Think the key for op is finding the right location and building business. There is still money to be had. Some indys are busier than the chains. And when op walks away from it, it will be with millions from the sale, not just the salary earned over the years.

 

[TateThePharmacist]

I've never personally worked in an independent pharmacy, but there's only two instances that I've seen an independent survive more than 5 years. The first in is a rural setting. As others have mentioned those settings really take off if you partner/connect with a clinic or the local rural hospital (either be close by or if possible rent some office space from them). I know it's the bane of pharmacy but.....I'd highly recommend having a drive through be part of the pharmacy. It'll really increase your numbers. This is America and people want and will pay for convenience. They got their McDonalds in the passenger seat and they wanna pick up their diabetes and blood pressure meds on the way home and still have their McDonalds be warm by the time they get home D@*# IT!!! To counteract your employees hating the drive through, I'd have a really nice break room (and actually allow/enforce breaks). Put in some nice couches and tables and have cable tv on a nice flat screen. Your employees will notice/appreciate the effort.
If you're looking at more urban setting, I've only seen a specialty pet pharmacy last more than 5 years in a metropolitan area (and they weren't just surviving, it seemed to me that they were killing it!). MOST people don't have med insurance for their pets, so it's run more like a normal business where you actually set your margins instead of fighting insurance for reimbursement. I believe the pharmacy I know did stereotypical pet meds, and both sterile and non-sterile compounding for pet meds.
A couple of other options for OP to look into are 340b and North Dakota. I don't know a ton about 340b pharmacies, but most of the 340b pharmacies that I've encountered seem to be in the green for their spreadsheets. And North Dakota was one of the few states that had the foresight to see what corporations would do to our profession and so long as it hasn't changed in the last few years, you can't own a pharmacy in North Dakota unless you are a licensed pharmacist. So chain pharmacies are non-existent in North Dakota. You'd be competing against other independents, and I can't see there being many independents having multiple locations because who are you going to sell to when you retire? You'd have to sell them off one by one because no pharmacist is going to have millions of dollars to buy your empire of pharmacies when you retire.
Anyways, best of luck to OP!

 

[Sabril]

It starts out as every single fairy tale, oh I hate retail and I would rather be my own boss, I want to give proper patient care, i will treat people with more respect et cetera et cetera. Can you stomach being deep in the red for a couple of months or even a couple of years, all while dealing with people who are happy to rip you off six ways to Sunday is another issue. It's a whole different level of shat hitting the fan than being abused at work while being up to your eyeballs in student loan.

 

[TerryTerry]

Make sure you have the money to pay your employees. You probably will need $80000 cash a year just to have two techs working.

 

[MountainPharmD]

As far as the front end goes...it has to make money. Even more so now days to make up for losses in the Rx department. I started a gun store on my front end in 2018. Not a bad move considering the panic everyone is in right now! To answer the OPs question, now is not a good time to open an independent.