Dr. P Lewis, president, Bowring Institute inaugurates the sixth Pill & Powder retail outlet in Bangalore

Pill & Powder Pvt. Ltd., a pharma retail chain concentrated in Bangalore, is planning to have a total of 20 retail outlets in the city by the end of 2005. Launching its sixth outlet here, Suresh AP Rao, head of operations, informed that the company would like to tailor out activities to develop an image as a community hub rather than a medical store by spreading out the retail chain to different parts of the city.

The sixth outlet, which is set up at a cost of Rs.12 lakh will be a drug and cosmetics retail outlet, he said. Pill & Powder conceived by Mahendra Chowhan, who has been in the pharma retail business for the last two decades is a retail concept run on similar lines like that of Apollo Pharmacy and Subiksha in Chennai and other cities in the country.

Purchase of drugs at the Pill & Powder necessitates strict prescription sales, which is usually not practised in other retail outlets. The presence of qualified pharmacists at the outlets could prevent sale of the wrong drugs.

Customers can walk-in and give their prescriptions to the pharmacists and while their drugs are being sorted, they can browse around the outlet for information on the latest drugs and become familiar with the list of the over-the-counter (OTC) medicine purchases. Plans are under way to introduce a service through the web where patients can provide their requirements over email which would be processed instantly and customers could come to the premises to pick up the drugs.

All the six Pill& Powder retails outlets have been put up at an investment cost of around Rs. 65 lakh in Bangalore. The retails outlets have registered a growth rate of 30 per cent annually which is higher than the national drug retail growth rate of 8.9 per cent, said, Suresh AP Rao, head of operations Pill & Powder. The overall response in the last three years since its inception in 2000 has been good.

Started the first outlet in 2000, Pill & Powder could set another five outlets in a span of three years though no fresh openings in 2002 due to the chain was scouting for the right person to head the retail chain operations.

In addition to sale of drugs, the outlets also are a forum for interactions between the pharmacist and the consumers who provide updates on the lifestyle related disorders like diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and nutrition etc. Services of dieticians and physiotherapists can be made available prior appointment. Regular programmes are organised where customers can interact with medical professionals for more information and control of diseases and disorders which are conducted by Pill & Powder or at the behest of the pharmaceutical company.