Maria Mallaband’s focus on care

Source: Healthcare Exec

Date :16/04/2008 09:04:16

With an aging population, it is no surprise that Phil Burgan took the opportunity to enter the care home sector. He tells Exec about his motivations and his company’s growth.

Written by Lucy Mowatt and Produced by Kiron Chavda

In 1996 Phil Burgan, the owner of a chain of pharmacies in the Leeds area, decided to take a side step into the care home sector, setting up a new company, Maria Mallaband Care Group (MMCG). Since 2002 he has dedicated his time to this business, after he decided to sell his pharmacies. Since then the company has seen incredible growth, which he hopes to maintain. With 49 care homes around the UK, the company is listed at number 65 on The Sunday Times’ list of the UK’s fastest growing private companies, the Fast Track 100.

“I felt quite vulnerable; I was 43 and had all my money and all my wealth tied up in that company,” Burgan explains. In 1995 the government was reducing NHS dispensing margins, and looking to abolish resale price maintenance on medicines, which meant that the future of the chemist business was not as secure as he would have hoped. As such, he explains that he decided to sell his 38 shops in the Leeds area and focused on care homes.

“We looked at the care home sector because we knew something about it – we used to supply monitored dosage systems to about 50 of them and knew the sector was flat, but looking forward there was a rising demographic,” he says. The company initially grew via acquisition, taking on profitable care homes that were not ready for the future needs of the population and creating value and equity uplift.

Diversification

However, the company hasn’t just acquired care homes; in 2006…

April 16, 2008