Pharmacy cooperation

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Pharmacy cooperations are associations of pharmacies in the form of an association that remain legally and economically independent, but use the community for various services. While some partnerships see their strengths in marketing , others aim to achieve economic advantages in the area of ​​purchasing or to promote sales via the Internet. Pharmacy cooperations follow the example of value-added or franchise partnerships in other industries. Examples can be found in entertainment electronics ( Electronic Partner ) or retail ( Edeka , Intersport , Obi ).

In Germany there are currently around 40 pharmacy cooperations with a total of around 7,000 members. The reason for this lies in the increasing price competition for pharmacy-only drugs in the pharmacy market. More and more mail-order and internet pharmacies or large retail chains are competing with independent pharmacies by placing drug buyers in mail-order pharmacies. In addition, the legal framework has changed, for example through the Drug Supply and Efficiency Act ( AVWG ) and the Statutory Health Insurance Competition Strengthening Act (GKV-WSG). The pharmacies are also affected by this, since according to the current legal regulation in Germany each pharmacist is only allowed to operate a maximum of four pharmacies. They are therefore looking for ways to maintain the quality and safety of health care in the future and to secure the position of their pharmacy in the health system .

The size of the individual pharmacy cooperations differs significantly: There are small associations that represent less than 100 pharmacies and often work regionally, as well as associations with more than 1000 participants. These large collaborations also occur nationwide. In most cases, the pharmacists pay a basic monthly fee for participating in campaigns and using marketing concepts.

Examples of large collaborations are " MVDA " (with around 3600 members alone; subgroup: " Linda "), "WAVE" (2017 merger of E-plus and A-plus with around 2700 members), " healthy living pharmacies " (with around 2,600 members), “ my pharmacy ” and “ parmapharm ” (healthy is colorful pharmacies GIB).

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