Today's Veterinary Business

AUG-SEP 2017

Today’s Veterinary Business provides information and resources designed to help veterinarians and office management improve the financial performance of their practices, allowing them to increase the level of patient care and client service.

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56 Today's Veterinary Business Merchandising There it was: a cover featuring an adorable, heart-tuggingly cute puppy with an ice pack on his head. The cover story, titled "Pets and Vets," explained how a pet owner could save thousands of dollars by finding cheaper veterinary drugs. For those of you who remem- ber, the story felt like the end was coming for veterinary medicine, but more specifically for retail and pharmaceutical sales within our practices. Jump ahead 14 years and our industry is still going strong. Our swift thoughts of demise were quickly proven invalid. With that said, retail and pharmaceutical sales in veterinary clinics continue to be one of the most emotional and passionate topics within our industry. Attitudes toward box stores and online retailers are all over the place — anger, helpless- ness, frustration, jealousy and revenge, to name a few. Consumer Reports wasn't at fault. The cover story happened to be a visual milestone that would mark a future of change. Yes, It Can Be Done I'll let you in on a little secret: Plenty of hospitals are benefiting and find- ing success from product sales. I get frustrated when I see energy and emotion wasted on something clinics cannot change: competition. Don't get me wrong. I am well aware of the sales hard - ships that clinics have experienced over the years. But competition isn't going away, and, in many ways, it will intensify. We need to focus our energy on what we can control. Innovation and adaptation I was traveling through the Salt Lake City airport in July 2003 when my flip phone rang. My colleague on the other end insisted that I run to the nearest newsstand to pick up the most recent copy of Consumer Reports maga- zine. I reluctantly complied. Merchandising SELLING POINTS By Brian Conrad, CVPM Compete and profit on product sales Squeezing revenue from retail isn't that hard if you know what you're doing.

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