Meet another past TWISB recipient!
Andrea Collaro PharmD, CDM
Senior Director, Owned Brands - Brand Management/Product Development Walgreen Co.
How did you launch your career in store brands?
I’ve been with Walgreens my entire career. I have a Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the University of Illinois, Chicago. I started in the Walgreens stores as a pharmacy tech, then progressed to a pharmacist and eventually a pharmacy manager. Through this career progression, I was introduced to our store brands as I would talk to customers and recommended solutions like our store brand vitamins for example.
My next career step was taking a shared faculty position teaching at UIC College of Pharmacy part-time and setting up fee-for-services disease state clinics at select Walgreens locations. This led me to become a disease state manager working in the Walgreens corporate office and training pharmacists around the country to help educate consumers on how to use blood glucose monitors and what to do with the results. Working with customers on how to use blood glucose meters and managing their diabetes put our store brands front and center.
Next, I became a buyer across many healthcare categories including diagnostics, senior related categories, vitamins/supplements, cough, cold and allergy. I was responsible for the P&L across brands and store brands. I left purchasing for a couple of years and went to our pharmacy procurement division and led our generic pharmaceutical strategy and global sourcing of pharmaceuticals – that’s when Walgreens Owned Brand organization was formed. I went back to purchasing to lead our healthcare product development of our owned brands. Teams were created around marketing, branding, sourcing, quality and technical, product development and innovation. Our strategy was grounded in offering up a suite of Walgreens Brand products to meet all healthcare needs at a great value. Today, we conduct unmet needs analysis in the market and develop products based on those findings. While national brand equivalents will always have a roll, we don’t wait for national brands to innovate. There’s a common thread across functions that the customer is at the heart of what I’m doing, and focusing on meeting those needs at a great value is key.
What have been some personally fulfilling moments in your career?
Something I really enjoyed early on was the shared faculty position. When I was setting up clinics in stores, I sat down with patients and asked questions like, “What do you do to manage your diabetes?” and “What are your glucose levels?” I also loved being a category manager, balancing brand and owned brand. That portion of my career really helped me understand the dynamic between the two and showed me what levers to pull to drive one or the other. Today, we have 15+ product managers on our healthcare owned brand business and more access to research than we ever have to focus on what matters to our customer the most. We consistently look at customer mindset and adjust strategy as that mindset continues to evolve. For example, in the last two years, clean ingredients have been a big focus. We’ve taken that customer insight to action. We have launched close to 30 items in the vitamin segment that are anchored into our platform. Another interesting example is pain management. There are only so many ingredients that you can use to innovate in this category so we are look to create complimentary products that address pain differently.
What did it mean to you to receive the TWISB Innovation Award and a PLMA Hall of Fame award?
It’s so humbling. I’m so passionate about this work, I don’t think about recognition. I feel very honored to be recognized amongst other impressive people. It’s such a distinguished group of professionals that have devoted their lives to developing best-in-class products.
What excites you about the future of store brands?
What I love most is that we control our own destiny. We’re not waiting for national brands to innovate. We dig deep into insights and how that translates to what customers are looking for and how we are meeting customer needs. We have plenty of products in our pipeline that were born out of insights.
What advice do you have for people who are new or early in their store brands career?
Stay on top of trends, whether it’s within your own area of focus or not. Look at other competitors and be diligent in watching marketing dynamics. I look at health and wellness products in the grocery store or in other parts of the private label realm. I also stay on top of trends in other countries too. More exposure to different ideas, helps you better think about transforming your business and differentiating from competition.
Are you involved in any DEI efforts or Employee Resource Groups currently?
When we look at product innovation, we take all of our customers’ unmet needs into mind – that means making sure our products are made for a diverse population. An example of this is our various skin tone bandages. We are extremely conscious about diversity when it comes to our products – having nearly 9,000 locations means there are many different local communities that we serve.