Amazon and the Veterinary Pharmacy

What comes next?

In a long-anticipated move, Amazon officially entered the prescription pet medication market in early May 2025 through a fulfillment partnership with Vetsource. This strategic expansion places Amazon alongside Chewy, Walmart, Tractor Supply, and other major retailers vying for a share of the rapidly growing $13 billion U.S. pet medication market. Already the dominant player in online pet retail, Amazon’s entry into veterinary prescriptions is a natural next step, particularly following its expansion into the human pharmacy space.

While this news wasn’t a surprise, it has been received with an outsized impact. Most of you reading this column have an Amazon Prime account and understand the ease, simplicity, and intuitiveness of the platform. While some competitors have built similar and equally functional platforms, Amazon brings 172 million U.S. subscribers to the party, who spend an estimated $30 billion annually. Couple that with the other Amazon business, and they are clearly well positioned to take market share in pet medications.

The news has also been met with calls for veterinary practices to lessen their dependence on pharmacy sales, and refocus those efforts on delivering care, which can be argued brings in the same dollars, in an area where there is plenty of opportunity and better margins. That’s a topic for a different day, but as distributor sales representatives, it’s your job to help your customers protect their pharmacy business, which is a key component of their annual revenue (and yours) making up approximately 20% of their sales.

What hasn’t changed is the veterinarian still has to write the script, giving them plenty of control over how they manage their pharmacy business. They are well positioned to win, but need to play to their strengths, not Amazon’s. Most customers still feel their veterinarian is the most trusted and respected person touching the lives of their pets.

Help them leverage that and integrate it into their care plans. Reinforce that they are a critical resource for pet owners, much like the physician is for human patients. Encourage them to emphasize the expert guidance they provide, the follow-ups they will make in the future, and how it all ties together for the good of the pet.

Of course, the price they charge for medications has to reflect market pricing, or they risk alienating their customers in the process. With that in mind, suggest they closely track and manage their pharmacy business, react to requests immediately, consider bundling care and medications together, and set up autoship subscriptions in their online pharmacies. They are uniquely positioned to keep the pharmacy business, and you should actively help them do so. It’s as important to you as it is to your customers.

Connect the dots

Reframe the pharmacy as part of total care. Show clients that medication isn’t a standalone purchase. It’s connected to exams, monitoring, and treatment plans.

Photo credit:

istockphoto.com/Aleksandra Yaskova