All posts

How to Assess the Value of a Pharmacy

Discover the essentials of pharmacy valuation with our expert guide. Learn about the benefits of understanding your pharmacy's market value, the key approaches to valuation including the market and income methods, and how to enhance your pharmacy's worth.
How to Assess the Value of a Pharmacy
Copy link

Pharmacies offer a wide array of health-related products including prescriptions, over-the-counter medications, beauty items, and various consumables. They play a crucial role in the healthcare sector, consistently attracting customer demand. The pharmaceutical sector has shown robust performance, boasting sales revenues exceeding $6.5 billion in recent years alongside healthy profit margins. Such trends are anticipated to persist, making the acquisition, expansion, or divestiture of a pharmacy a potentially lucrative endeavor. Nonetheless, the sector is not without its hurdles, such as fierce competition. Gaining insights into pharmacy valuation is instrumental for success.

Understanding the valuation of a pharmacy comes with numerous advantages. The most effective strategy involves obtaining a business evaluation. Through this process, a valuation expert will guide you in comprehending the fair market value of a pharmacy, enabling you to enhance the worth of a pharmacy you are looking to buy or sell.

How to Determine the Value of a Pharmacy

Our firm frequently employs the market approach and/or the income approach for pharmacy valuation. These methods offer different insights into a pharmacy's value, with the chosen method depending on factors like the valuation's purpose, pharmacy size, and the nature of the business transaction. Typically, the valuation process amalgamates these approaches.

Valuing a Pharmacy with the Market Approach

This approach entails comparing your pharmacy to similar entities that have been recently sold. Factors such as size, location, and customer base are considered. For privately owned pharmacies, valuation specialists utilize databases of private transactions to collect pertinent data. This approach is widely used for pharmacy valuation.

Valuation Multiples

Multiples, key elements of the market approach, are financial ratios that relate a business's value to its financial metrics like earnings, sales, or cash flow. Specific NAICS or SIC codes are used to ascertain the appropriate multiples for a pharmacy. Here, we explore the application of common valuation multiples.

Seller’s Discretionary Earnings (SDE) MultipleThis multiple is used to calculate a pharmacy's value based on its earnings, applying the multiple to the pharmacy's SDE to establish a fair market value.

EBITDA Multiple

It assesses a pharmacy's value based on its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, aiding in understanding the potential return on investment.

Revenue or Sales Multiple

This multiple evaluates a pharmacy's value in relation to its total sales, with the pharmacy's sales multiplied by the multiple to find its fair market value. This multiple is less frequently used in pharmacy valuation.

Valuing a Pharmacy with the Income Approach

Another prevalent method, the income approach, values a pharmacy based on its future income or cash flow prospects. It also considers the risks involved in buying or selling a pharmacy. Key risk factors include location, financial stability, regulatory compliance, and competitive landscape.

Income Approach Methods

Two common valuation techniques under the income approach are the capitalization of cash flow method and the discounted cash flow method. These assess a pharmacy's value based on its income potential, with the former suited to stable businesses with consistent earnings and the latter ideal for businesses with solid financial histories and reliable forecasts. However, the reliance on future cash flows can introduce subjectivity, making this method somewhat less dependable.

Summary

Valuing a pharmacy involves a combination of methods, primarily the market and income approaches, to provide crucial insights for valuation experts. Obtaining a business evaluation is crucial to understand the best valuation method for your pharmacy, along with its risks and benefits, whether you're looking to buy, grow, or sell.

Founder to Freedom Weekly
Zero guru BS. Real founders, real exits, real strategies - delivered weekly.
Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.
Our blog

Founders' Playbook: Build, Scale, Exit

We've built and sold companies (and made plenty of mistakes along the way). Here's everything we wish we knew from day one.
Ultimate Business Brokers Guide: Maximize Value in Buying or Selling a Business
3 min read

Ultimate Business Brokers Guide: Maximize Value in Buying or Selling a Business

Discover how business brokers help buyers and sellers achieve the best value. Learn about their roles, fees, and benefits, plus tips to ensure a successful transaction.
Read post
Understanding Seller's Discretionary Earnings (SDE): A Guide for Small Business Owners
3 min read

Understanding Seller's Discretionary Earnings (SDE): A Guide for Small Business Owners

Discover the importance of Seller's Discretionary Earnings (SDE) for small business valuation. Learn how to calculate SDE, improve your business's value, and make informed financial decisions with this comprehensive guide.
Read post
Unlocking True Business Value: The Role of Add-Backs in Maximizing Valuation
3 min read

Unlocking True Business Value: The Role of Add-Backs in Maximizing Valuation

Discover how add-backs can significantly impact small business valuations. Learn to identify, document, and justify financial adjustments to showcase true profitability and secure the highest sale price.
Read post
Quality of Earnings Reports: A Comprehensive Guide for Investors and Stakeholders
3 min read

Quality of Earnings Reports: A Comprehensive Guide for Investors and Stakeholders

Discover the importance of Quality of Earnings (QoE) reports in financial analysis and decision-making. Learn how these reports assess sustainability, uncover risks, and support informed investments in mergers, acquisitions, and beyond.
Read post

How can we help?

Need help or assistance? Our team is standing by to make sure you get the help you need. Whether you need to grow or exit your business, we're ready to help!