The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 270 No 7243 p467
5 April 2003

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UniChem (www.unichem.co.uk)

Marketing scheme lifts sales for UniChem

Sales of non-prescription medicines at pharmacies that are members of UniChem's Community Pharmacy Initiative plus (CPI+) scheme have increased by more than 10 per cent in the past year, the company says.

Compared with average independent pharmacies, members of the scheme have seen pharmacy medicine sales increase by 10.5 per cent, general sale list medicines by 12 per cent and other health care products by 16 per cent.

Speaking at a press briefing on 27 March, Peter Skinner, head of marketing at UniChem, said the success of the scheme came from active marketing, merchandising and promotional support and from identifying slow-moving stock that can be replaced with better-selling lines. "We have found that around 40 per cent of the 5,500 lines carried in a typical independent is dead stock. Replacing this with products customers want to buy gives more clarity to the displays and can improve pharmacy cashflow."

Mr Skinner said that CPI+ has also identified categories such as wound care, diagnostics and incontinence where community pharmacies should increase their involvement. There are currently around 250 CPI+ members and UniChem wants to increase this to over 400 by next year.