{"id":679175,"date":"2026-07-07T20:51:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T20:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/679175\/"},"modified":"2026-07-07T20:51:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T20:51:15","slug":"wegovy-pills-land-in-stores-as-retailers-report-huge-demand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/679175\/","title":{"rendered":"Wegovy pills land in stores as retailers report huge demand"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"picture\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"wegovy-pill-bottle-cropped.png.corpimgw.2000.2000\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/399817_wegovypillbottlecropped.png.corpimgw.2000.2000_70870.jpg\"   loading=\"eager\" class=\"lazyloaded\" width=\"750\" height=\"546\"\/><\/p>\n<p>The first <a class=\"intextlink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thegrocer.co.uk\/glp-1-weight-loss-drugs\/3257.subject\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"intextlink_5 nofollow noopener\">Wegovy<\/a> weight-loss tablets have begun arriving via home delivery and in stores, with retailers boasting of huge demand for the new <a class=\"intextlink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thegrocer.co.uk\/glp-1-weight-loss-drugs\/3257.subject\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"intextlink_6 nofollow noopener\">GLP-1<\/a> treatment.<\/p>\n<p>The UK\u2019s first weight-loss pill launched on Boots Online Doctor on Monday, with customers able to <a class=\"intextlink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thegrocer.co.uk\/click-and-collect\/2620.subject\" rel=\"intextlink_0 nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">click &amp; collect<\/a> in store the same day. Thousands of patients also received their first deliveries of the tablets on Monday, according to Simple Online Pharmacy.<\/p>\n<p>Both retailers said they had received thousands of pre-orders, many from people trying weight-loss treatment for the first time, after the pills <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thegrocer.co.uk\/news\/weight-loss-pills-granted-uk-regulatory-approval\/720064.article\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">received UK regulatory approval in June<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Recent research from Worldpanel showed weight-loss jabs wiped \u00a3780m from annual UK grocery spend in the year to the end of February, as the rate of households with at least one user surged from 2.3% in 2024 to 6.3% in 2026. The <a class=\"intextlink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thegrocer.co.uk\/availability\/2983.subject\" rel=\"intextlink_3 nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">availability<\/a> of a needle-free alternative is widely expected to further boost demand for the drugs.<\/p>\n<p>Boots said thousands of people had completed consultations to be among the first to receive the pills, and nearly two-thirds of them were accessing weight-loss drugs for the first time from the retailer.\u00a0The treatment starts at \u00a379 for new Boots customers taking the lowest available dose, or \u00a399 for existing customers. Wegovy jabs are available from Boots starting from \u00a379.97 a month without a discount for new customers.<\/p>\n<p>Simple Online Pharmacy said more than 60,000 people had joined its waiting list for the pills, and over 10,000 had been approved and prescribed the medication for dispatch. The online chemist was taking pre-orders starting from \u00a399 a month with a \u00a330 introductory discount, again making the pills more expensive than the jabs, which are listed from \u00a399 a month without an introductory discount.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Wegovy pill is a major development because it gives patients another way to access semaglutide without self-injecting,\u201d said Simple Online Pharmacy chief clinical officer Abdal Alvi.<\/p>\n<p>Boots chief <a class=\"intextlink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thegrocer.co.uk\/healthcare\/92.subject\" rel=\"intextlink_4 nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">healthcare<\/a> officer Jamie Kerruish said: \u201cThe introduction of the new oral Wegovy pill is an important addition to our weight-loss service. It forms part of our continued support for weight management through both in-store support, including our new dedicated weight-loss journey support zones, and online through the wealth of resources available on Boots Online Doctor.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Superdrug yesterday highlighted a 300% increase in demand for its weight-loss service in the first half of 2025 as it reported a 5.2% increase in sales for the full year.<\/p>\n<p>$(document).ready(function() {<br \/>\nif (window.location.pathname == &#8216;\/advertise&#8217;) {<br \/>\n$.getScript(&#8220;https:\/\/tag.clearbitscripts.com\/v1\/pk_6c1cac1dc287e45bfaab20867b193dcb\/tags.js&#8221;);<br \/>\nconsole.log(&#8220;Clearbit Loaded&#8221;);<br \/>\n}<br \/>\n});<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The first Wegovy weight-loss tablets have begun arriving via home delivery and in stores, with retailers boasting of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":679176,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[102,6591,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-679175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-medication","tag-health","tag-medication","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=679175"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679175\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/679176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}