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Though the number of walk-in clinics in retail pharmacies has surged over the years, 2016 stands to see slow growth, says Adam Fein, CEO of the Drug Channels Institute.
This week, Fein posted an overview of the retail clinic arena on his Drug Channels blog, including a chart listing the top players — CVS (MinuteClinic), Walgreens (Healthcare Clinic), Kroger (The Little Clinic), Walmart (Care Clinic), Target (Target Clinic), and Rite Aid/H-E-B (RediClinic) — which altogether account for roughly 95% of the just over 2,000 retail clinics.
In his 2016 report on the pharmacy industry, Fein points out that 2015 saw slower growth in the retail clinic count as pharmacy operators re-examined the business model, yet the case is still solid for continued clinic openings. “While 2016 may see little growth, I still expect the number of retail clinics to reach 2,300 to 2,500 locations by 2018,” he said in this week’s blog post. Fein is also president of Pembroke Consulting.
And the retail clinic field will see some shifts among the top players. CVS’ MinuteClinic, which already has more than half of today’s retail clinic locations, is set to add the Target Clinic locations (to be rebranded as MinuteClinic) with the closure of CVS Health’s purchase of Target Corp.’s pharmacy and clinic business. And RediClinic, a subsidiary of Rite Aid, is slated to go into the Walgreens Boots Alliance fold if its pending acquisition of Rite Aid gets the OK from regulators.