SHELF OBSESSED

The customers and patients you serve every day do more for you than just keep your business going – they are also pivotal in bringing in new business via good customer reviews. Now more than ever, when your customers have a stellar (or not-so-stellar) transaction experience with you, they have the opportunity to immediately share their experiences with their family, friends, and their "world" through social media.

An inefficiency is anything that impedes, slows down, or clogs up pharmacy workflow in any way that prevents it from being as effective as it can be. Inefficiencies are generally the result of failing to establish specific processes, not streamlining workspace foot traffic patterns, or failing to organize inventory for best practices and compliance with HIPAA regulations.

Do you need new pharmacy shelving? You might, especially if your workflow efficiency is slipping.

Some of the hallmarks of a suffering workflow may look like:

• Grumbling customers having to wait longer to pick up their prescriptions
• You spending less time with your customers because you don't have the spare time to chat
• You or your staff making more mistakes between steps
• Fewer scripts being filled, and thus lower profits

Building a new pharmacy can be exciting and daunting at the same time. There are so many pieces and moving parts for you to consider and to make your best decision (and sometimes your best guess!) on.

Workflow is one component of pharmacy management that truly does make all the difference. Not only does it benefit you and your staff by making the process more streamlined and efficient, but it also trickles down to create a positive impact on your patients' satisfaction with your service.

Harsh overhead lighting with a significant glare.

Fluorescent lighting "tubes" that create an uncomfortable, almost indiscernible "buzz" that can literally give your customers a headache

These were the pharmacy lighting options of old, but no more!

Looking for an easy way to give a much-needed facelift to your store?

New retail shelving can do this – even if you're on a budget.

As an independent pharmacist, you do everything you can to serve your customers to the best of your ability every day – and that includes keeping up with emerging pharmacy trends. Recent trends in pharmacy, like the establishment of pharmacy clinics (for patients' non-emergency healthcare needs), are a great way to boost your bottom line and help your customers and patients out at the same time.

But there's one among the old pharmacy trends that's making a comeback: the soda fountain. Today's incarnation also includes a coffee bar as customers look for alternatives to supermarket and fast food resources, and place more value on having centralized meeting places for building a community.

Efficiency is incredibly important in the pharmacy world, and there are a number of factors that can affect it – customer service, inventory, personnel, and prices, to name a few. One of the most important aspects regarding pharmacy efficiency is pharmacy design. The way a pharmacy is physically designed and structured can have a major impact on pharmacy efficiency as it relates to pharmacy workflow.

You do everything you can to make your customers and patients comfortable so that their shopping experience is as pleasant and stress-free as possible. However, there's a new trend on the rise in pharmacy design, and it's something that you might even enjoy for yourself as well: Bringing the outdoors in.