The Swedish pharmacy market

The Pharmacy market’s total sales in 2018 was 45 billion SEK (41) an increase of 10 percent compared with 2017. 75% of sales are prescription drugs, 9% are non-prescription drugs and 16 percent are commodities. The share of commodities is increasing. E-commerce share of sales is also increasing and correspond to 10 (8) percent of total sales and 16 (11) percent of total volume. All pharmacy chains offer E-commerce via their website. In addition there are three pharmacy chains offering e-commerce only.

Since the deregulation of the Swedish Pharmacy market in 2009, the number of pharmacies has increased by 493 pharmacies, or by 53 percent. There are now a total of 1 422 pharmacies in Sweden. Pharmacy density is 14 pharmacies per 100,000 inhabitants, which is, despite the increase in pharmacies, well below the average in Europe which is 34 pharmacies per 100,000 inhabitants.

The number of services offered at pharmacies increases and the industry is working to provide additional services in the field of drug counseling, healthcare, health and wellbeing on their own or together with the healthcare professionals.

Average opening hours per pharmacy has increased by 11 hours a week since 2009. As number of pharmacies have grown, total opening hours have increased by 90 percent since 2009.

The pharmacies continue to have extremely high Customer Satisfaction. The proportion of customers who were pleased with their latest pharmacy visit was 98 (99) percent in SIFO´s measurement in the last quarter of 2018. The proportion of customers who gave the two highest ratings, "outstandingly good" or "very good", was 80 percent.

Every day, 330 000 people visit a pharmacy, either physically or an internet pharmacy. In total, 120 million visits were made in 2018. Almost 40% of the visits are made by customers who receive prescribed medicines. During the year 2018, pharmacies received a total of 90 million recipes in Sweden, an increase of 2,1 percent compared to 2017. The pharmacy industry had 11 200 employees in the same year.

Source: The Swedish Pharmacy Association Industry Report 2018 SIFO.