The economics of the European apothecary can be measured by simple data regarding the institution ‘s membership, pricing, and targeted audience. The apothecary guilds grew exponentially from the 14th century to the 18th century records show that over 120 apothecary guilds existed in the 1700‘s in large European cities. Numbers of members differed from place to place. London ‘s two guilds, for example, Boasts and the Apothecaries Hall, had 312 licensed practitioners in 1650, and Paris in 1680 boasted 278 members. Pricing was tightly controlled local ordinances made a certain formula (for example, a standard herbal poultice costing 2-3 shillings) the standard. Other elixirs would be marked up 300-400% costing 8-12 shillings when raw ingredients cost 2-3. Consumer access also varied drastically by class, gender, and city size. Urban upper classes had near complete access, whereas survey data on the merchant class indicates one 85% of urban, middle-class households made purchases from the apothecary, 25% of rural ones. There were also huge differences in the presence of this market between locations: in Italy, 92% of towns greater than 5,000 had an apothecary, in Germany less than 40% of country towns did. Guilds made monopolies, founding’s fines of 5-10 florins. This paper fits the apothecary into the framework of European economic history by addressing all of these points with quantitative data. In doing so, the research demonstrates the dual uses of pharmaceuticals: they were necessities for health and economic commodities that had their prices and target audiences controlled. The quantitative data, although sparse, speaks to the future of drugs: the same pricing and access issues that plagued 17th century Europe haunt us still.