CVS: The Web Strategy
History, Development, and Growth Established in 1963, Consumer Value Store (CVS) was founded by brothers Stanley and Sidney Goldstein and business partner Ralph Hoagland in Lowell, Massachusetts. CVS began the operation of its first stores with pharmacy departments in 1967, opening locations in Warwick and Cumberland, Rhode Island. In 1984, CVS/pharmacy became the 15th largest pharmacy chain in the U.S. with 408 stores and $414 million in sales. With growing success CVS decided to acquire a web based startup company, Soma.com, the first major online pharmacy, for $30 million in stock. The web site, soon rebranded CVS.com, enabled customers to order prescriptions and general merchandise for either in-store pickup
…show more content…
Physicians can use the web to communicate to patients. | |
| | |
|3. Real estate division launched an interactive online mapping | |
|program. | |
Strengths
CVS pharmacy is one of the nation's largest retail pharmacy chains, with over 7,000 stores across 41 states. With more than 40 years in the retail pharmacy industry, CVS/pharmacy generates over 68% of its revenue from the pharmacy business. It fills more than one of every seven retail prescriptions in America, and one of every five in their own markets. Operating within CVS Pharmacy stores are three operating segments: CVS/pharmacy, Caremark Pharmacy Services, and MinuteClinic, a walk in clinic. Caremark Pharmacy Services is one of the nation's leading pharmacy benefit management (PBM) companies. It provides comprehensive prescription benefit management services to over 2,000 health plans, including corporations, managed care organizations, insurance companies, unions and government entities. MinuteClinic is a
CVS is a company that has been around for over fifty years and focuses on filling the needs of an older population looking to get their medication and other essentials all in a one-stop shop. A very similar business in this niche is Walgreens. Through evaluation of both sets of financial statements from each company, the investor can make a better educated decision on whether or not to invest in stock at CVS.
5. CVS’ additional competitor Walgreens is behind them by a market cap of roughly $10
Walgreen Co. (Walgreens) and its subsidiaries operate a drugstore chain in the United States. “The Company provides its customers with multichannel access to consumer goods and services, and pharmacy, health and wellness services in communities across America” (Walgreen Company). The firm currently operates two mail-order facilities and has 7,752 retail drug stores located across all 50 US states, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia (Walgreens). Prescription drugs account
The applicants are morally correct as long as their action promotes their long term interest. If their action produces or will produce for them a greater outcome of good, versus evil in the long hall than any other alternative, than that action is the right one to act on, and the individual should take that to be a moral act. An Assessment of Morality by Ethicsinbusiness.net
As a member of management Clive Jenkins is responsible for boosting employee morale to ensure that company goals are met
The Pharmacy services have a full range of pharmacy benefits manager with more than 65 million plan members that enable people, businesses and communities to afford a healthy life style in an effective way. Pharmacy services segment of CVS offers mail order, specialty pharmacy and infusion services, formulary management, discounted drug purchase scheme, Medicare part D services, retail pharmacy network management services, prescription management services, clinical services and disease management services. CVS also provides health management programs for 17 conditions.
IgG – funtions in neutralizing, opsonation, compliment activation, antibody dependent cell-mediated cytocity, neonatal immunity, and feedback inhibition of B-cells and found in the blood.
According to CVS pharmacy they now offer more than 1,100 Minute Clinic locations inside CVS Pharmacy and Target stores in 33 states. We have expanded services to include diagnosis and treatment of minor illnesses, injuries and skin conditions; administration of vaccinations, injections, health screenings and physicals; and monitoring for chronic conditions.
Walgreens’ principal activity is to operate a chain of retail drugstores that sells prescription and nonprescription drugs. The company also carries additional product lines like general merchandise including cosmetics, food, beverages and photofinishing. Walgreens is one of the fastest growing retailers in the United States and led the chain drugstore industry in retail sales and profits last year.
A major disadvantage of this strategy is that by not obtaining personal information about their customers they are forfeiting their ability to send coupons and ad information about special discounts that may be of interest to their existing customers that could potentially encourage them to purchase items. They are also giving up the ability to track customer purchases to create a costumer profiles that would allow advertising targeted specifically for particular customer needs and interests.
Both CVS Corporation and Walgreen Company operate retail drug stores in the United States. In addition to having pharmacies and selling prescription and non-prescription drugs both retailers also sell general merchandise. This includes items like beauty and cosmetic products, convenience foods, household items and film & photofinishing services.
“CVS was founded in 1963 by Stanley and Sidney Goldstein and Ralph Hoagland. The first CVS store was opened in Lowell, MA.” (CVS Health) CVS is a pharmacy innovation company helping people on their path to better health. CVS’s CEO is Mr. Larry J. Merlo. CVS is headquartered in Woonsocket, RI. CVS is the largest pharmacy health care provider in the U.S. And is an integrated offerings across the spectrum of pharmacy care. Through their 7,700 retail pharmacies and more than 900 walk-in medical clinics. There are approximately 200,000 employees in 46 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. “CVS has also expanded its business to include pharmacy benefit management, mail order as well as specialty pharmacy division,
Current Industry. The retail drug industry’s 2010 combined annual revenue was $277 billion, according to the National Association of Chain Drug Stores (Drug Store Industry…, 2011, par. 4).The big players in this industry are CVS Caremark, Corp. Walgreen Co., and Rite-Aid, Corp with Wal-Mart and Target developing more of a presence in recent years. According to the article, the drug store industry is very concentrated with the 50 largest companies generating about 70 percent of the industries revenue (Drug Store Industry…, 2011, par. 4). The industry had grown substantially in the last 50 years and will continue to innovate and develop well into the near future.
CVS, Wal-Mart, Medco Health and Rite Aid are Walgreens’ major competitors. Wal-Mart aggressively competes by its use of the $4 generic prescriptions promotion. CVS employs a similar strategy by offering a 90-day supply of generic medications for $9.99. Medco Health also competes with CVS by offering a 90-day supply of medications for a cheaper price than a customer would pay in-store. As of 2008, Walgreens and its major competitors were measured as follows10:
Mirroring its main market competitor, CVS, Walgreens has also added Envision Pharma, a pharmacy-benefit management company, to its portfolio. (CVS acquired Caremark in 2007) (Bells, 2016) Due to previous acquisitions and mergers, Walgreens is currently the most accessible pharmacy retailer in the U.S., servicing 8 million customers each day and filling approximately 894 million prescriptions and immunizations, every year. (Walgreens, n.d.)