Pharmacy shares win with community

A commitment to meet the needs of the community and excellent team work has led to a national award for Unichem Cambridge Pharmacy.

The business, under the management of Kevin and Jane Burgess, and, Kim and Virginia Munro, was awarded the Unichem Pharmacy of the Year Award and then was named Supreme Winner – Pharmacy of the Year 2016, at the Green Cross Health conference in Fiji recently.

Green Cross Health represents more than 345 community pharmacies in New Zealand under the Unichem and Life Pharmacy brands. Kevin Burgess said the awards recognised the business’ development over 30 years in Cambridge.

‘‘Kim and I were in opposition for about 15 years and then we decided to come together and amalgamate. Many of our staff came with us and some have been with the business for 30-plus years.

‘‘We celebrated our 20th anniversary in June with a huge promotion organised by Kim Munro and our retail team. This was a major contributor to us winning this prestigious award, and included a sale, special events and promotions for beauty brands and natural health.’’

It’s a quality judges would have recognised when they came to measure the business as part of the awards process.

‘‘They judged us a lot on the way we have adjusted to our customers and our community. We now open seven days a week and have added new professional services,’’ Kevin said.

Those services included flu vaccinations, cholesterol testing and rheumatic fever swabbing to name a few. Kevin said the pharmacy is well suited to adapt further, if needed, to meet Cambridge’s growing population.

Jane Burgess said the pharmacy’s commitment to the Green Cross Health franchise was a priority for the business and would continue into the future.

‘‘We really get behind the promotional activity Green Cross Health provide us with,’’ she said.

Jane said overall the award was a way to recognise the businesses success, its partnership with its owners and the com- munity.

‘‘It’s a celebration of the great team we have and our community, which has been very good to us, and we like to think we’ve been good to the community too.’’

‘‘We’ve had our celebrations ith the staff and now we want to give back to the community, by providing 20 per cent off in store, for four days. It’s our way of saying thank you to the community.’’