Sometimes Bad Things Come to an End

Our illustrious leader is no longer with us, ladies and gentlemen. The pharmacy director for our region has moved on. Questions still remain as to why he left the company. Perhaps it was the number of complaints about him. Perhaps it was the number of pharmacists that quit. Perhaps it was a rat leaving a sinking ship. We just don't know.

But what I do know is that this guy had some weird view of what pharmacy is all about. He would routinely come into the pharmacies and move and/or remove anything that made us look like a pharmacy.

He would stand out in the aisle, staring... then move to another vantage point, stare some more, then come in and move stuff. You see, he didn't want us to LOOK like we were a pharmacy. If he could see a box of amber vials, he would move it where it couldn't be seen by a customer. If he could see a note or phone number pasted up where he could see it, he would come in, pull it down, and put it in a binder... to go with the other 150,087 binders we have in the pharmacy.

We have a long counter separating the front register area from the back where we do the filling. It is about 24 feet long and 2 feet wide. It's a great place to put filled prescriptions, papers, projects. It's a WORK counter designed for WORK.

No, we do NOT look like this...

No, having anything on that particular counter was offensive to this guy. It had to be completely clear at all times. We don't want to look like we actually do any pharmacy work in a pharmacy. Now I can understand looking like a cluttered mess. That looks bad. But a little clutter just looks like you're busy, and it gets removed by the end of the day when we get caught up.

No, keep it clear at all times, we were told. Why? Because his whim and fancy demanded it.