When Mitesh Soma, founder of internet pharmacy Chemist Direct, launched a new service enabling customers to order prescription medicines more cheaply online, he knew it would be all about the hard sell.
Soma says the service is proving extremely popular with City workers in their twenties and thirties who are buying sex stimulants like Viagra and having them delivered to their offices.
He says at least 30 per cent of all orders for Viagra and Cialis pills in London have delivery addresses of leading banks and law firms across the City, Docklands and the West End.
Many are bankers, hedge fund managers and lawyers who are getting the pills delivered straight to their desks so they can avoid having them arrive through the post at their homes where their wives and girlfriends might find out.
“Increasing numbers are getting private prescriptions from their doctor and buying the tablets through us to steer clear of walking into their local chemist,” says Soma, who set up web pharmacy Chemist Direct in November 2007 and is set to hit the £4m-turnover mark this year.
“Many of the customers are men under 35, and often much younger. We have qualified pharmacists who check every order, and sometimes they also provide advice over the phone to customers. It seems that many young men are under pressure to perform, and that's why they feel they need the help.”
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