Keeping Steady
A (Sweaty) Hello! Seems like most of the world was been suffering from excessive heat these days. Hopefully you are finding ways to remain cool as the summer steams forward. Fortunately - for us anyways - the heat has not delayed any news related to veterinary business and economics.
You may have noticed we are starting to get some consistency on our heading titles within the newsletter. Definietly try to mix up the good and bad news so that the dismal science (AKA Economics) doesn’t bring you down too much. Enjoy your weekend!
—CN &JB
Company Performance (7/14 - 7/21)
Access, Access, Access…..Say that 5 times fast
(Source: GIPHY)
It seems like everywhere we turn these days someone is talking about increasing access to care for veterinary services. And while we try to sound like a broken record(…okay we ARE just repeating various news stories here, but we digress), access to care is back in the news. PetSmart Charities is donating $15 million to support innovative work on creating and scaling business models that help increase access to care. Financial access to care is the biggest barrier for most pet parents. This is largely a result of the cash-for-services model that is still predominate in the industry. So until that model changes it will continue to sound…sound…sound…like a broken record.
Do Green Cows Produce Green Milk?
(Source: http://hispecialzme.blogspot.com/2009/10/cow-hunting-is-sport-but-not-really.html)
Animal health and environmental health are continuing to intertwine more than ever. And while we aren’t talking about cow farts today, the fact is that animal agriculture is a key contributor to greenhouse gas emissions and improved animal health can help in the fight against climate change. In a recent report, there is a call for governments to increase support investments in research and other policies to help increase animal health standards that also incorporate climate impacts. This is a big move towards the need for a robust food animal veterinary workforce. This is especially true for developing countries where meat consumption is expected to rise the most in the coming decades.
Latest On Research
(Source: GIPHY)
Check out the latest work from some of our friends over at the AVMA! While a veterinary clinic doesn’t really exist without a veterinarian, non-veterinarian staff are still highly important to business profitability. In fact, a 1-hour increase in veterinary technician work hours is associated with a 20.5% increase in revenue! That is over double the increase from additional working hours from a veterinarian. In our humble opinion, that says a lot about why you should be paying your veterinary technicians more.
A Dose of Happiness
Did you know a group of emus are called a “mob”? Well neither did we! Apparently a family feud between some mobster emus broke out in Colorado. Good news is that Singleton found a family in animals that don’t look like him. We can all learn a little about accepting each other’s differences from this unique family situation.
If you are in need of a new pup, over 4,000 beagles need a home! Check out the story here.
General Economy Update
(Source: GIPHY)
Well I think it’s safe to say that this week proved to be relatively flat to slightly (knock on wood) better than the past week on how the economy is going. Gas prices have been on a downward trend for 30+ days now (but still suck in our opinion), stocks are saying “hmmm maybe we can go steady for a bit”, and we didn’t have any economic report updates this week. So if the weather (and the FED) would just cooperate we might end up with a smooth ending to the month. Now that we have jinxed that from happening…. Remember to stay cool!
Poll of the Week
We can now do polls! Now it is more than ever important to share and have your friends in the industry subscribe to the newsletter. We want your opinion on current topics related to veterinary business and economics. Even better, we can’t see how you respond so even if you are the lone wolf on how you respond no one will know it was you! We will reveal the results of the poll next week and have a new one for you to fill out.
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