by Dennis Dalman
In her ongoing search to make medical care more personalized, more accessible and more affordable, Nurse Practitioner Saundra Lauer will open her “WELL & Company” in St. Joseph in May 2025.
It will be located at 106 Second Ave. NW near the post office and across from the city’s baseball field, in a refurbished building that has stood at that site for more than 100 years. In 1905, it was as “Pallansch’s Garage,” a Ford auto dealership. The building has been empty for at least 20 years.
Lauer, an Alexandria resident, earned a doctorate degree in nursing practices from North Dakota State University, Fargo. She owns and operates two WELL & Company clinics – one in Alexandria (opened in 2020) and one in Sartell (opened in 2022). There are 4,200 patients who now go to one or the other of those two clinics. At the Sartell clinic, 60 percent of its patients live in or near St. Joseph – a good reason to open a clinic in that city.
And Lauer is certainly no stranger to St. Joseph. Her husband Samuel’s parents and grandparents grew up there, and she and Samuel have kept in touch with the city and its people for years.
“We are a community-based clinic,” said Lauer in an interview with the Newsleaders. “And we have a great community in the St. Joseph area.”
WELL & Company
WELL & Company locales are primary- and urgent-care clinics at which staff spend plenty of time communicating with patients and where patients are the number-one priority, Lauer said. It also serves as a clinic for 20+ companies as their employee health benefits solution.
The clinics offer procedures such as onsite EKGs, lab services and minimally invasive procedures. WELL & Company also has a subspecialty in medical aesthetic services such as facials, injectables and expertise in acne care.
The clinics operate on a cash-based model, although patients’ insurance plans can be billed for lab work, imaging, medication and referrals to specialists.
The St. Joseph clinic will be open normal clinic hours with someone on call on evenings, weekends and holidays for urgent-care needs for members. The membership option is a monthly fee and offers what Lauer compared to the on-call doctors of years ago who made their rounds carrying a medical bag.
The clinic will welcome “walk-in” customers.
When Lauer opened her first WELL & Company clinic, it was only one of three such clinics in existence in Minnesota five years ago. Now there are at least 35 clinics who now offer that kind of model of personalized health care, Lauer noted.
Ever since her college years, Lauer had hoped and dreamed of someday opening a clinic that focused on community, personalized and affordable care. Her dream will be realized a third time, this time in St. Joseph.
After graduating from college, Lauer worked as a nurse practitioner for four years at a CentraCare clinic.
Lauer’s husband, Samuel, is a commercial-construction project manager. They have two boys, ages 7 and 5.
Fond memories
During her interview with the Newsleaders, Lauer interspersed her comments with fond memories of St. Joseph and its people based on meeting those people and her husband’s nostalgic memories of them. The following are just some of them.
In-laws, relatives
Samuel’s mother and father were Kevin and Dana (Schreifels) Lauer, who were married many years ago in the St. Joseph Catholic Church. At one time, Dana worked at Kay’s Kitchen.
‘Tower of Power’
One “legendary” story, oft repeated among aging buddies throughout the years, is the time Kevin was playing on the St. Joseph Joes baseball team when his bat connected with a ball that rose high into the air, above the street and slammed into the upper part of an old building standing there – the very building that will be “home” to the new WELL & Company.
Kevin’s team mates, wildly excited by his baseball feat, all bounced over to Sal’s Bar downtown to drink back-slapping toasts to their slugger friend whom they dubbed “Tower of Power.”
Coincidence
Kevin worked at the very same building where the new clinic will open when plumber Nick Froehle had the space. Kevin worked there with his friend Carl Schnideler.
Grandparents
Samuel Lauer’s grandparents were Arnie and Ann Lauer. Ann, a homemaker, rather “accidentally” provided the design for the St. Joseph water tower. She had been a member of a ladies’ quilting group when she’d designed a quilt based on the St. Joseph skyline. Somebody noticed, really liked it and, lo and behold, her quilted scene was soon painted on the water tower.
Arnie Lauer was a carpenter/construction worker and sang in the Catholic church choir.
Lauer is convinced that all of those fond memories cherished by her husband and her are good omens that now is the perfect time to open another Well & Company right smack dab in the heart of good old St. Joseph.
Nurse Practitioner Saundra Lauer is the owner/operator of two “Well & Company” clinics, one in her home city of Alexandria, the other in Sartell. A third will open next year in St. Joseph.
