A Coast-to-Coast Road Trip to Envy

I always envied Charles Kuralt when he did his award-winning "On the Road" segments for CBS. Road trips have always been my favorite way to travel to see this great country of ours. I drive any chance I get.

Well, now I am going to be envious of our special projects editor, Bruce Kneeland, who has landed an assignment that would be “right up my alley,” and I can’t think of a better individual to take it on.

Bruce, who has been a long time ally of independent community pharmacy, is going to undertake a cross country road trip designed to let him see first hand how innovative independent drug stores are coping with the challenges of today’s market place.

The coast-to-coast road trip is scheduled to begin in Point Pleasant, N.J., on Monday, April 13. Most of the trip is scheduled to be taken on secondary roads, not major highways or Interstates so that. “I can really see the towns and neighborhoods in which these successful pharmacists practice” Bruce says.

From that point he will drive in a south-westerly direction through Baltimore, on through Nashville, up to St. Louis and then across Kansas to Denver. From Denver the route will take him across the Rocky Mountains into Salt Lake. He will then continue through Nevada and end up in San Francisco on Monday, April 28th.  

The trip is being sponsored by AmerisourceBergen’s Good Neighbor Pharmacy program. The purpose of the trip is to seek out and report on 20 to 25 of the nation’s most interesting, innovative and successful pharmacies and to share with all independent pharmacies some of the things these progressive independents are doing that makes them successful.

Most of the stores selected for visits are being nominated by AmerisourceBergen’s GNP Managers. Still others will be selected based on recommendation from state pharmacy association executives, independent buying group managers and the owners of various pharmacy computer companies with which Kneeland has a close association.

NCPA’s America’s Pharmacist magazine will publish a series of three articles highlighting the findings of the trip in their August, September and October issues with a bonus distribution being planned for the NCPA Annual Convention in Tampa in October 2008.

If you would like to know more about the trip, you can contact Bruce at 610-792-2477, or e-mail him at bruce@pharmacyconnections.com.