Pity the poor pharmaceutical sales rep

Amid mounting competition and a backlash against Big Pharma's aggressive sales tactics, drug reps are looking more and more like an endangered species.

By Aaron Smith, CNNMoney.com staff writer

It's hard out there for drug sales reps--particularly if they work in places where gaining access to doctors is becoming increasingly difficult।

Take Boston, Glenn Abrahamsen, senior director of global analytics for drug company Schering-Plough says the city is full of medical groups with formal policies restricting the access that company reps have to individual doctors। "We weren't allowed to leave samples: not tissue boxes or anything," said Abrahamsen, "We weren't allowed past the receptionist।"

Such "closed door" policies are now common around the country, especially in Washington, Minnesota and Wisconsin, according to anecdotal evidence from drug sales reps and medical groups. The backlash--fueled in part by double-digit increases in advertising spending by Big Pharma--is turning the industry on its head. Sales reps are facing massive layoffs and falling incomes as commissions drop. Drug companies, meanwhile, are scrambling to come up with new ways to get their medications in front of the doctors who would prescribe them.

In one sign of the dislocation, Pfizer is in the process of laying off 2,200 sales reps, or about one-fifth of its U.S. sales force. Industry watchers expect rival companies will soon follow with cutbacks of their own.

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