Walgreens Community Management Project

BY: Rajan, Sudev, and James

Improving Customer Experience

in Walgreens Pharmacy.

The Goal

The goal for this project is to improve the

customer experience in the pharmacy. We will

begin with analyzing areas for improvement,

and then offering possible solutions.

Introduction to Pharmacy

Goal: Give people the best experience possible.

Differentiate us from competitors

Determine the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and

threats

Have customers leaving the store happy

SWOT Analysis - Walgreens’ Pharmacy

Strengths

● Technology- Intercom plus

● Large retail network

Weaknesses

● Lack of cross training front store

employees’

Opportunities

● Alliance Boots

Threats

● CVS’ purchase of Target Pharmacies

● Increased labor costs

● Changes in regulations

● Increase and spread of drug abuse

Walgreens Vs. Competition

Competition

CVS+Target

Rite-Aid

Walmart

-Walgreens has more 24-hour stores than both CVS and RiteAid combined.

Reasons to improve customer service in the

Pharmacy?

It is hard to get a person to

walk into your store.

The pharmacy brings in

60% of normal sales in

the store.

It is easy for an upset

customer to walk out

and never come back.

How to Monitor Progress

Delight Scores

Surveys

1-800-Walgreens

Surveys: What do the customers think?

How would you rate your overall pharmacy experience today on a scale of 1-5. 1 being poor and 5

being excellent?

Why do you choose walgreens for your prescriptions?

What suggestions do you have for improving customer service in the Pharmacy?

What we learned from speaking with customers

Walgreens is a preferred pharmacy for certain insurance companies, meaning that patients are able to get medication for

cheaper if they go to Walgreens Pharmacy

One of the main reasons customers choose walgreens is for convenience and location.

Customers are easily able to find alternative means of getting their medication, and having poor customer service can have

a detrimental effect on sales.

The drive through is convenient

Friendly and helpful staff always make customers’ experience better

Patients are being notified that medication is ready, and when arriving to pick it up they are having to wait.

Several customers, after observing the pharmacy, said that they think there needs to be more people working.

Delight Scores

Delight scores reflect how the store is doing in

any given department

Delight scores better help us understand

where to improve on

Delight Scores

Problems that are causing poor customer satisfaction

Customers want to be in and out. When they have to wait, they are

unsatisfied.

Pharmacy wait time correlates to customer satisfaction.

What should be the maximum amount of time a customer should have to wait

for their medication?

Pharmacy wait time exceeds 15 minutes

Approaches to improving customer service

Procure pharmacy externs who are looking to gain first hand experience

We get extra help without having to pay more money, and in return the extern is trained and

gains valuable experience

develop relationship with pharmacy technician schools

Push pharmacists to improve workflow management

Bottleneck effect

Cross train store clerks to work in the pharmacy

Training Log

Extern Technicians

Reach out to pharmacy tech schools.

Workflow Management

Workflow Management

Workflow management is very important to run a

pharmacy efficiently. Without a proper balance, a

bottleneck effect will occur and medication will not be

ready in minimal time.

Bottleneck effect: A point of congestion in a system where

workloads arrive more quickly than that point can

handle them. The inefficiencies caused by the

bottleneck effect create a queue and longer overall

cycle time.

Workflow Management

The pharmacy can easily experience a bottleneck effect

when there is an imbalance in the workflow.

ie. There are significantly more prescriptions under

data review.

The technician cannot fill a medication until the

pharmacist reviews the script.

ie. There are too many product reviews

the medication cant be sold until the pharmacist

reviews the product in the final stage.

Workflow Management

Clearly, managing workflow is extremely

important. Pharmacists and technicians must

work together to keep the workflow balanced.

Poor workflow leads to excessive wait times,

and thus unhappy customers.

Training log