By Miles Flynn | Southern Indiana Business Report
MITCHELL — When Engleking Rx opened its doors in Mitchell in February 2017, pharmacist Ryan Engleking believed an independent pharmacy that focused on personal relationships with its patients would make the business a success. Now, just four years later, that guiding principle is helping fuel an expansion into Marengo, 30 miles to the south.
Engleking grew up in Hardinsburg, in western Washington County, and developed the desire to work in pharmacy after taking in a demonstration on compounding during his freshman year of high school. Specifically, he saw himself working in retail pharmacy because of his desire to interact directly with patients. It was a career goal that never wavered, and it took him to Butler University in Indianapolis.
Engleking went to work as a retail pharmacist in 1998 and then spent another 13 years with a chain pharmacy in Paoli while looking for an opportunity to launch his own business. He said owning a pharmacy is something that had been on his mind since pharmacy school. The desire grew as he saw more and more decisions moving to the corporate level, pulling the pharmacy further and further away from the patient-centered approach that’s always been so important to him. “I’ve always enjoyed the interaction with my customers and patients,” he said.
The timing just never was right, especially when he and his wife Tina were busy raising their children, Adam and Jalyn. When he turned 40, though, he said, “That desire really started to burn a little bit more inside.”
Engleking and his wife discussed the idea more and began to take a careful look around the region for just the right fit. He said Mitchell presented an opportunity. At that time, the city of 4,350 was served by just one pharmacy — part of a national chain. “We felt like Mitchell was a good area,” Engleking recalled.
The couple decided to purchase a vacant building on Main Street that had been a bank. They closed on the property in October 2016, and the new business opened four months later. The store’s performance exceeded expectations. “We’ve been really pleased with the response,” Engleking said. “I feel like the community has supported us extremely well.”
The growth allowed the family to hire more personnel, including two additional pharmacists to help shoulder the load, and to roll out more services. The location now offers delivery; medication adherence packaging for “daily doses;” service to some local long-term care facilities; point of care testing, including flu, A1C and cholesterol; and vaccinations, including COVID-19. “We’ve done over 5,000 COVID vaccines,” Engleking shared.
The pharmacy’s quick success also led Engleking to start looking around the area for other communities for possible expansion. Marengo stood out as a good candidate. Crawford County, population 10,713, is served by just one pharmacy — a national chain store — in the county seat of English.
The couple purchased another vacant bank building. While initial plans were for a telepharmacy, as newly allowed by Indiana law, the decision ended up being made to staff the location. The new pharmacy opened on July 2 of this year. “We’ve, again, been pleasantly surprised,” Engleking said of the Marengo operation.
The store is offering many of the same services as the Mitchell location, and the pharmacist brought on board for Marengo is Abe Ingle, who had been working since 2004 in nearby Corydon.
Between both locations, employment now stands at approximately 20, with a mix of full- and part-time positions. Engleking said the business continues to look at ways both to expand offerings at its two locations and, possibly, to bring new stores online in the future.
Engleking believes the services offered by the stores is in keeping with a national trend that’s seeing pharmacies shift beyond merely dispensing medicine and instead follow a clinical model in order to serve patients holistically. He also believes independent pharmacies, with their focus already squarely on patients, are ideally suited to meet the need. If a business isn’t constantly up on the latest research and working to keep ahead of changes, he said, it will quickly become a dinosaur. And Engleking added he’s not ready to become a dinosaur any time soon.