Most people who reach this page have already decided they want to sell medicines, and are now weighing an allopathic range against Ayurvedic or nutraceutical lines. The short answer: allopathic products move faster because doctors write them every day, but the paperwork is heavier and every district already has competition.
The companies above offer an allopathic PCD franchise. Filter by your state and city, open a few profiles and compare the product lists before you call anyone. Below is what we usually tell first-time buyers.
Licences you need before the first order
An Ayurvedic or FSSAI-registered nutraceutical range can sometimes be started with lighter paperwork, depending on your state. Allopathic medicines cannot. A company with a proper set-up will not dispatch stock to you without these:
- Drug licence on Form 20B and 21B for wholesale of allopathic drugs. Form 21C is needed separately only if you plan to stock Schedule X products, which most franchise ranges avoid.
- A qualified person named on the licence. This is a registered pharmacist, or a person with the education and drug-trade experience your state drug controller accepts.
- GST registration in the name of the firm that holds the drug licence.
- Proper premises: the minimum floor area, clean storage and a refrigerator if you will keep any cold storage items. The drug inspector checks all of this before the licence is issued.
The licence usually takes a few weeks, sometimes longer. Apply while you are still shortlisting companies, not after.
Range breadth and the doctors you can reach
The real advantage of allopathic over Ayurvedic or nutraceutical is that you can walk into almost any clinic with something useful. A general physician, a gynaecologist, a paediatrician and an orthopaedic surgeon all write antibiotics, PPIs, analgesics and multivitamins. With a herbal range you depend mostly on BAMS doctors and counter sale. With nutraceuticals, you depend on doctors who believe in supplements and on how hard you push.
Still, a 400-product list is not automatically better than a 120-product list. Count how many of those products are molecules your doctors already prescribe, in the dosage forms they prefer. A wide range with weak packaging and no samples will sit in your godown. Ask each company for its top 30 moving products with PTR, and check those 30 against your doctors.
What the first year usually looks like
Be realistic. Most new allopathic PCD franchise partners spend the first three months getting the licence, placing the first order and visiting doctors with visual aids and samples. Prescriptions start slowly, usually from a handful of doctors you already know. Months four to eight are about chemist availability around those doctors, so that a prescription does not bounce at the counter. By the end of the year you should know which 15 to 25 products actually sell in your area and which ones you will stop reordering.
Cash is tight in year one. The first order, promotional inputs, licence fees and your own travel all come before collections. Keep money aside for a second order in month two or three, because that is when stock-outs begin if things are going well.
Before signing, get these in writing: monopoly area (district or state), minimum first order, PTR, PTS and MRP for each product, dispatch time, expiry and breakage return policy, and how often new products are launched.
Send one requirement and let companies call you
Instead of calling twenty companies one by one, post your requirement through the form on this page. It is free, your number is not published, and it goes only to companies whose range and area match what you wrote. Mention that you want an allopathic PCD franchise, the district you want, the speciality of the doctors you visit, your expected first order and when you plan to start. Companies showing the licence-checked badge have had their licence details checked, which makes them a sensible place to begin.
Related pages: Gynae PCD Companies and Antibiotic & Antifungal Pharma PCD Companies. Molecules most listed here: Paracetamol, Zinc, Methylcobalamin.