business

For years, retailers have latched on to the back-to-school season as a major selling opportunity for clothing, shoes and backpacks during those few weeks in August.

Now, some clinics are getting the same idea.

MinuteClinic and Target Clinics are advertising steep discounts for sports physicals. Park Nicollet Clinics is sending out direct mailers -- one postcard shows a little boy standing on a counter, wearing goggles and swim shorts, a green towel tied like a cape around his neck, with the words: "Even superheroes need check-ups."

And last weekend, for the first time, Fairview's Eagan clinic hosted a kindergarten roundup, offering well-child visits for kids heading into the new school year.

The recent promotions reflect a new approach in health care: marketing by seasons. Hospitals and clinics traditionally market to people based on life stages -- surgeons give talks on joint replacements to seniors, for example, and hospitals promote maternity services to young families. The back-to-school push aims to provide convenient services before a deadline.

"The old joke is nobody knows they need health care until they need it," said Chris Bevolo, a Twin Cities health care marketing consultant. "But here is an opportunity for seasonality or situational marketing, when you know something is needed."

Slow season

Retail clinics in particular tend to see their biggest volumes during the winter months when sneezing, hacking patients stream in. So any added business during the usually quiet summer months is a bonus.

MinuteClinic has dropped prices for its camp and sports physicals to $35, from $69, through Sept. 19. Not to be outdone, Target Clinic is discounting its sports physicals to $29, from $59, through Sept. 30. Most schools require them to make sure a kid can safely play sports.

"August and September have been among the slowest months of the year for retail clinics," said Tom Charland of Merchant Medicine, a retail clinic consultancy based in Shoreview. "Yet practitioners are paid to be there. By discounting a sports physical and someone comes in and pays $29, vs. no one coming in at all, that $29 drops straight to the bottom line."

Traditional clinics also are targeting the back-to-school crowd, though they're not going as far as dangling discounts.

On Saturday, Fairview's Eagan clinic hosted a half-day kindergarten health fair, offering well-child visits for kids heading into the new school year.

The clinic sent letters to all its patients between 4 and 6 years of age, and dispatched one of its nurse practitioners to appear on local TV to promote the event. But they may have started promotions too late, said administrator Katie Holley-Carlson.

Only five kids turned up. These kids got lots of one-on-one attention from physicians, nutritionists and even representatives from the Dakota County sheriff's department, who showed up to demonstrate car seat safety and bike safety. The rack rate for a well-child visit is around $500, though most insurance companies cover them 100 percent.

At Park Nicollet, back-to-school postcards started going out in July to patients at five of the group's busiest clinics. Park Nicollet charges about $200 for its checkups, which officials say are more comprehensive than the retail clinic variety.

"It's not really comparing apples to apples since we don't do stand-alone sports physicals," said spokesman Jeremiah Whitten. "For the safety of our patients, we believe that a sports physical should be part of a high-quality, comprehensive clinical health evaluation."

Attracting patients

While not everyone's doing it -- a spokesman for Allina Hospitals and Clinics, the Twin Cities' biggest group, says it's not doing any special back-to-school marketing -- the promotions reflect rising competition for patients at a time when many people are skimping on medical services because of the economy.

"A lot of this is a battle of attrition," Bevolo said. "Some of it is to draw patients in and some of it is defending your turf."

The back-to-school discounts have boosted the number of visits to both Target Clinics and MinuteClinic, officials said, though neither would provide numbers.

This is the third year that Target is offering sports physicals and the second year they've been discounted. "Target is seeing a strong positive response to our sport and camp physicals promotion," spokeswoman Erin Madsen said.

Already, clinics are gearing up for the big one: flu season.

A few years ago, October was the semi-official start of the flu-shot season. Then last year, it moved up to September. This year, Charland said, is the "first time I'm seeing flu shots introduced in August."

Chen May Yee • 612-673-7434