Business Spotlight: Pharmacy Compounded

Building on 60 years of family pharmacy work, second-generation pharmacist Gary Grove is capitalizing on a newfound niche and a strict focus on pharmaceuticals rather than incidental retail products.

“We try to be experts in the pharmaceutical field, not in selling diapers,” says Grove, owner of Grove Pharmacy, which operates three Springfield pharmacies and a spa.

Grove Pharmacy’s expertise is showcased, in part, at its sterile compounding facility that creates custom prescriptions for doctors and veterinarians.

“We fill compounds for people and for animals, from mice to elephants,” Grove says.

Founded by Grove’s parents, Donald and Lucille Grove, in downtown Springfield’s Woodruff Building in 1952, the pharmacy has only been performing compounding services since 1995. After adding a $500,000 dedicated compounding facility in 2008, the custom scripts have grown to half of all retail sales and 30 percent of company revenues, Grove says.

While Grove declined to disclose revenues, he says the company has grown 9 percent in 2011 and is projected to grow another 21 percent and add 10 employees in 2012.

One of the noted differences in the pharmacy business in recent decades is the insurance industry’s influence on patient care.

“Now, we have to tell the customer that their insurance may not cover certain medications they need or that it will take time for the company to approve it,” Grove says. “But we’ll do everything we can to help the patient; we don’t give up the fight.”

The independent pharmacist also has learned to compete with big-box chain pharmacies by emphasizing speedy service, offering a deep pool of generic drugs and pricing cash sales lower.

“Gary has stayed abreast of the latest in the industry, as well as stayed on top of what an independent retailer needs to do in order to survive in a city with big box retailers,” says Mike Bach, a retired senior vice president of sales and marketing for McKesson Pharmaceutical, a longtime supplier to Grove Pharmacy.

The pharmacy has a policy to fill prescriptions within 15 minutes and sells up to 150 generic prescriptions for $3 to $4. “A lot of times, our specialty price is lower than a person’s co-pay,” Grove says, adding that even when patients use insurance, the co-pay is the same as at a larger retail chain. “We all sign the same contracts.”

Grove bought the business from his brother, Don Grove Jr., in 1986. “We started working at the pharmacy in elementary school,” Gary Grove says. “My brother, sister and I delivered medicine and worked the soda fountain.”

Grove’s father closed the downtown location in the late 1970s and moved the entire operation to 1522 E. Sunshine St., which had opened in 1968. The family added a pharmacy in 1980 at 100 E. Primrose St. in the Ferrell-Duncan Clinic across from Cox South Hospital. Gary Grove added Grove Spa to the 6,000-square-foot Sunshine store in 1995. The spa provides massage therapy and other cosmetic and medical spa services.

“I just wanted to do something that was fun and people enjoyed,” says Grove. “People don’t always like buying medication when they’re sick, but they always enjoy coming to a spa.”

In 2006, Grove decided to venture into the deli business and added an eatery to the 1,500-square-foot Primrose site. “The people at the Ferrell-Duncan Clinic wanted a place where their patients who had been fasting could get food after their tests,” he says.

The latest addition is the 2,000-square-foot sterile compounding facility at 3050 S. National Ave. that produces medications for hormone replacement therapy, as well as topical, injected and oral medications that may not be in production commercially or may not be in production in the strength a certain patient requires. Grove’s customers include Dickerson Park Zoo and local animal preserves.

The pharmacists and technicians are specially trained in compounding, and Grove says the pharmacy is under strict testing guidelines by the Missouri Board of Pharmacy to ensure it meets licensure requirements.

Grove says the compounding facility has allowed the company to increase its compounding business by 75 percent. Overall, the Sunshine location brings in 45 percent of revenues – including the spa – and the Primrose location represents 25 percent.

Although Grove purchased two competing compounding operations in the past few years, he isn’t planning other acquisitions or retail additions. “We’re going to fine tune what we have,” he says.

He also has no plans to retire and is looking forward to the company’s 60th anniversary in 2012. “I hope to be here for the 100th,” Grove says.

He does hope at least one of his sons will someday take over the business. His oldest son, Whitney, had worked in the business but struck out to pursue other interests. Colby is in his last year at the College of Pharmacy in Erie, Pa., but Grove says his plans are uncertain. Nick currently works as a technician and operations manager at Grove and is studying for his MBA at Drury University. He hopes to attend University of Missouri-Kansas City’s Pharmacy School, his father’s alma mater, and become a third-generation pharmacist in his family’s business.

“I just hope to continue what my grandpa started and do whatever is needed to keep the business going,” Nick Grove says.[[In-content Ad]]