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NACDS: a group like no other

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Editor’s note: This editorial was written prior to NACDS’ decision to hold this year’s Annual Meeting as a virtual event.

With the approach of February, the chain drug industry turns its collective eye toward April and the National Association of Chain Drug Stores Annual Meeting, that traditional harbinger of the industry’s spring, time of renewal, rebirth, new opportunities and, hopefully for some, new beginnings.

And that’s as it should be. It is only fitting that NACDS, that industry pillar, should welcome chain drug retailing into the new year and choreograph the road ahead for an industry that has unfailingly, not without sufficient reason and previous success, been optimistic in its approach to tomorrow.

In past years, the Annual Meeting has been cause for celebration apart from its appropriate business agenda and political update. It has been a time for the industry to come together as few industries do, a week to cement old relationships and embark on new friendships, a period of renewal and rebirth. “Hi. When did you get here,” has become more than a greeting. It has become, in the industry’s lexicon, the way we greet old friends and advance relationships with new ones, the way we, at the Annual Meeting, express our pleasure at seeing each other yet again, and expressing, as best we retailers and suppliers can, how happy we are to be once again where we belong.

Not this year. Though NACDS continues to behave, with conviction, as though the Annual Meeting will go off as scheduled, many industry people who really know, or claim to know best, insist that it will not come to pass. Why? Partly, it’s a question of logistics, the daunting task of bringing thousands of people together who have become accustomed to not being together, who have gotten used to not traveling, who have come to be contented at being alone.

Then, too, a question of inertia. While most industry people eagerly await, indeed dream of, a renewal of this key chain drug event on the industry calendar, the clearest-eyed among us understand the difficulties ahead. The old adage of the battleship turning in mid-ocean comes to mind. Programming this event to NACDS standards is difficult enough. Galvanizing its participants to make the necessary plans, file the necessary papers, book the necessary travel arrangements, take the necessary steps prior to departure — that’s asking more of us than most of us are capable of delivering.

What then? To answer that question, to swallow that hard truth, to accept the unacceptable, let’s assume for a moment that the Annual Meeting has been postponed to August, there to be folded into Total Store Expo, that other NACDS pillar that is integral to keeping the industry afloat. The answer to that question, then, is simple: Who knows.

This much is certain, however: The industry will survive. It is too strong, too well established, too steeped in tradition and success to allow it to be sidetracked by one missed conference, or two or three.

On the other hand, still assuming the worst, something will be missing in the absence of the Annual Meeting. And it falls to NACDS to provide that missing piece. This would not be so if NACDS was merely another trade organization, no better or worse than all the others. Fortunately, this is not the case. NACDS is special. Have an issue? A question? A problem? Call NACDS. Call Anderson. Call Whitman. Call someone at NACDS. And the answer is (almost) always forthcoming — even if there is sometimes no answer.

As is the case here. Frankly, there is no acceptable substitute for the Annual Meeting. And it would take smarter intellects than are presently available to this industry to conjure up some suitable ideas. However, there are alternatives. We have, in the space of an interminable year, become a “virtual” society, even if we’re not sure what that actually means. So we can, we must, find some virtual alternatives to the Annual Meeting.

Where do we begin? That’s an easy question to answer. Call Anderson. Call Whitman. Call someone at NACDS. One thing that’s for certain: Whomever you call, that person will answer. And show some interest in the call and the caller. And once you state the reason for your call that interest will only be heightened.

Oh yes, the reason. That again is a more difficult question to answer. But, to help you out a bit, here are some opening words: “Hi Steve (or Jim or whoever answers the phone). How are you. Glad to hear it. I’m calling because I have some suggestions …”

From there you’re on your own.


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