Service lets cold and flu victims order instant medication from their bed

Walgreens and TaskRabbit have collaborated on a scheme that enables housebound flu sufferers to get essentials delivered without leaving their bed.

We’ve already seen dedicated services that aim to deliver specific health products to consumers as quickly as possible — such as Dr Ed, the site that gets morning after pills to those that need them in under two hours on a weekend. Now Walgreens and TaskRabbit have collaborated on a scheme that enables housebound flu sufferers to order essentials without leaving their bed.

Although it may seem pathetic to everyone else, those currently experiencing a cold or flu will know that it’s a Herculean task to even think about looking for the paracetamol, never mind going to the shop to get some. To help sufferers out, the pharmacy and crowdsourced task completion service partnered, enabling users of the TaskRabbit app to easily order Walgreens products from their house. The campaign ran in the 19 cities serviced by TaskRabbit between 7 January and 18 February — identified by Gallup as the period when most people get affected by seasonal bugs. Throughout the six-week stint, customers could simply pay the Walgreens price for any medication and essentials they needed, as well as the standard cost for delivery by TaskRabbit, and have the items arrive at their door within a couple of hours.

The campaign was arranged by OMD’s Ignition Factory, and — although only temporary — could there be other ways to strategically partner with other businesses to create a new, useful service such as this?