Todd Ross on supplies: ‘We take the good with the bad’

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Todd Ross grew Preferred Medical, a medical supply distributor, from a $1 million business with one location to a $300 million business with six locations, ultimately selling it to NDC in 2018. Now, he aims to put Finnegan Health Services on the same growth trajectory. 

Ross bought Finnegan Health Services, a medical supplies provider, two years ago this July and serves as the company’s president and CEO. He’s also a board member of the Arkansas Medical Equipment Providers Association, which he helped form. 

“I was on the box moving side and now I’m dealing with patients and payers,” he said. “The provider space is more difficult to grow in, so I expect it will be more methodical and slower, but I feel like we can do the same thing here.” 

Finnegan Health Services was founded in 1983 as Finnegan Pharmacy and extended its offerings to include DME supplies in 1984. It became Finnegan Health Services in 1994, offering incontinence, urinary, ostomy, wound care and diabetes supplies, as well as enteral nutrition, to Medicaid, Medicare and private insurance patients statewide. 

Working on the distributor side, Ross saw the importance of service and that’s what he’s doubling down on at Finnegan Health, which is on pace to double its business in two years. 

“I saw how (providers) made their business with service,” said Ross, who maintained his president and CEO role at Preferred after the sale and then became chief strategy officer at NDC. “The nationals tend not to do everything, and referral sources want everything in a product category. So, we take the good with the bad, and we turn it around faster and more consistently.” 

While Ross grew Preferred without acquisitions, he’s open to leveraging Finnegan Health as a platform to roll up other providers in the supplies market, which is becoming more competitive with the likes of Medline and McKesson selling their supplies businesses to Homecare Delivered and AdaptHealth, respectively. 

“We have several LOIs and NDAs with companies right now to expand our geography (into contiguous states),” he said. “We can take some small bites and be their exit strategy.”