In June of 2003, Advanced Chiropractic Clinic will open to serve the St. Mary's, Pennsylvania area. Dr. Jamey Azzato, a chiropractic doctor and recent graduate of Logan College of Chiropractic will be the owner and operator of the clinic. The clinic will specialize in the fastest growing alternative health care field, chiropractic.
The chiropractic approach to health care is holistic, stressing the patient's overall health and wellness. It recognizes that many factors affect health, including exercise, diet, rest, environment, and heredity. Chiropractors provide natural, drugless, nonsurgical health treatments, and rely on the body's inherent recuperative abilities.
The clinic will provide quality chiropractic services to people of all ages. The clinic will utilize new equipment and a trained staff, able to care for the individual needs of every patient that enters the clinic.
Our clinic's keys to success are to put the patient's health issues first and to treat each person as an individual, with individual health care needs.
Sales are projected to increase from $99K the first year to about $120K the third, and profits almost negligible for the start-up phase of this business. We show a break-even point after seven months of business in December of 2003.
The projected net profit for the first three years is approximately $5,000/yr. We are projecting very conservatively regarding gross margin. Our client base should grow much faster than the projections. We prefer to project conservatively so that we make sure we have enough cash for unexplained costs.
1.1 Objectives
- Gross revenues of $120,000 in year three.
- Net profits of $5,000 for each year in the plan.
- Average patients visits per month of 165 during first year and 195 visits per month by year three.
- Patient visit average of 20 visits per patient per year.
- Collections of 95% or more and missed appointments under 5%.
The above figures are very conservative for patient visit averages when compared to the national average of 135 visits per week or 540 visits per month. We are keeping our figures on the low side to show that even if our clinic only produces one third the national average for patient visits per month that the business model is still viable.
1.2 Mission
The mission of Advanced Chiropractic is to promote the well-being of people in the St. Mary's community (and surrounding areas) by providing accessible, quality chiropractic care for people of all ages, utilizing a service system that emphasizes trust, respect, confidentiality, and compassion.
We are committed to quality chiropractic care that focuses on the overall health of every patient, including rehabilitation and exercise advise, continuing patient education, ergonomics training, and nutritional support. We are further committed to the philosophy that we exist for the patient.
1.3 Keys to Success
Referral
Our internal marketing strategy emphasizes educating patients to the benefits of chiropractic care. This factor alone will provide referrals and build a solid patient base.
We will also network to obtain referrals from other professionals, such as lawyers, accountants, medical doctors, and other businesses in the area. Our educational procedures include patient focus groups, questionnaires, videos and mailings.
Systematic Procedures
By setting up our office to run efficiently and systematically we will decrease chance of errors and increase the number of patients we can see per hour. This translates into greater revenue and less internal complications.
Moreover, we will institute electronic billing procedures, which will cut down on paperwork and will increase ease of patient tracking. Our office floor plan is set up in such a way to also decrease the time it takes to provide quality chiropractic care per individual visit.
Reputation
Becoming well known in a community takes time, but once this trait is established it can increase the success of a clinic. Our clinic will accomplish this by going out into the community, church groups, high schools, and networking with other professionals in the area.
Location
Location is less important once you have the above factors in place. In the early stages of building up a chiropractic practice, having an office front on a busy street will definitely increase the likelihood of random walk-in patients.
Having accessible parking and being located where traffic isn't too heavy can also attract those patients that don't want to have the stress of "finding a parking place" or "paying for parking on a busy city street." Being located in an area with a high patient to doctor ratio can also be beneficial.
Our clinic will be located on North Michael Street, which is in close proximity to downtown St. Mary's.
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