Designs on Retail

Call it a historical fact. The home medical equipment industry is a service — not a retail — industry. But in the age HME is entering now, and with an aging population willing to pay for products that will keep them active, retail could help save endangered small companies by shoring up sagging bottom lines.

Certainly that has been the mantra of many industry consultants over the years, and it's a cry that has grown louder as HME has lately been hammered by legislative and regulatory mandates that threaten the very life of many companies.

Meet two companies that, while accredited and accepting Medicare assignment, also have managed to build strong and successful retail divisions.

Sparrow Regional Medical Supply
Lansing, Mich.

From its beginning 22 years ago, retail was an integral part of full-line HME Sparrow Regional Medical Supply.

“From day one, we've had retail,” says Darwin Brewster, company director. The company's major product lines are oxygen, CPAP and diabetic supplies, but through the years, the retail segment has grown steadily, particularly in the flagship Lansing store, one of five Sparrow locations.

“Our retail has gotten so busy we need to add some customer service reps up front,” Brewster says.

Now, the retail part of the Lansing operation accounts for about one-third of the location's business. “We get a little less than 3,000 walk-ins a month,” says Brewster.

Perhaps people are drawn by the recently remodeled store. It's bright and spacious at over 3,500 square feet, as Brewster describes. “It's not some dark, dingy place. It's got nice, high ceilings and a lot of light. I think [customers] feel more comfortable.”

Guided by the idea that the customer comes first — “How would you like to be treated if you were the customer?” Brewster asks — the company created a retail setting designed to be customer-friendly.

Plentiful signage points people to various products, which are attractively displayed along walls and in home-like settings that show off products. “We actually have bathroom displays with tubs and showers; same thing with bed products,” notes Brewster. The CPAP section features glass mannequin heads fitted with various masks and cannulas “so people can see what they really look like.”

Prior to the remodel, there was a problem with people waiting to be checked out. It was lost time to them and sometimes they just walked out of the store, Brewster recalls. Sparrow brought in Lisle, Ill.-based Gladson Design Group to help.