I did some internet research and found the following that gives some insight about just where people live in the United States (and possessions)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_population
See the last column for the percentage of the U.S. population living in each state. You will note that about 32% of our total population is concentrated in four states - California with 12%, Texas with 8% and New York and Florida with 6% each. Add the next 5 with the most population and you have just 9 states with 50% of the country's population.
If you assume that there are so many people per primary care doctor and so many doctors per rep, you can draw some pretty good conclusions about how reps will be distributed in the new slim and trim Novartis. Assuming that rep distribution will be similar to population distribution per state and not factoring in how major cities near state lines may affect rep territories (it will), you might have numbers roughly like this -
California - 102 reps, Texas - 68 reps, New York - 51 reps, Florida - 51 reps, about 34 each for Illinois and Pennsylvania, about 30 for Ohio, 25 for Michigan, Georgia, North Carolina and New Jersey, 21 for Virginia, maybe 16 or 17 for Washington, Massachusetts, Indiana, Arizona (concentrated in Phoenix, Tucson and Flagstaff), Tennessee, Missouri and Maryland, about 12 or 13 for Colorado, Alabama, South Carolina, Louisiana, and Kentucky. Note, I left Minnesota out because of the situation there where reps are excluded in a lot of places. They are the same population wise as the last few states listed so let's be optimistic and give them 8 reps. The states with about 1% of the country's population each - Oregon, Oklahoma, Connecticut, Iowa, Mississippi, Arkansas, Kansas, Utah and Nevada will each have about 8 reps. I bet in Nevada about 5 or 6 reps will be in and around Las Vegas and the other 3 will be up in the Reno - Carson City area. The remaining states, have less about 1/2 of 1% or less of the U.S. population so each of them will have between 2 to 4 reps each.
Note - a fair number of reps will have territories that cross state lines so this clouds the picture. Memphis, TN reps will have some territory in northern Mississippi and/or eastern Arkansas. Reps out of the New Orleans area or Mobile, AL, may cover the Mississippi gulf coast or maybe someone out of Jackson or Hattiesburg will cover the Biloxi-Gulfport area. It really all depends on how district lines are drawn.
One thing that is for certain is that there will be a lot more travel for many reps and some will have significant travel maybe for those in large western states with a low population density such as Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota and South Dakota.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_population
See the last column for the percentage of the U.S. population living in each state. You will note that about 32% of our total population is concentrated in four states - California with 12%, Texas with 8% and New York and Florida with 6% each. Add the next 5 with the most population and you have just 9 states with 50% of the country's population.
If you assume that there are so many people per primary care doctor and so many doctors per rep, you can draw some pretty good conclusions about how reps will be distributed in the new slim and trim Novartis. Assuming that rep distribution will be similar to population distribution per state and not factoring in how major cities near state lines may affect rep territories (it will), you might have numbers roughly like this -
California - 102 reps, Texas - 68 reps, New York - 51 reps, Florida - 51 reps, about 34 each for Illinois and Pennsylvania, about 30 for Ohio, 25 for Michigan, Georgia, North Carolina and New Jersey, 21 for Virginia, maybe 16 or 17 for Washington, Massachusetts, Indiana, Arizona (concentrated in Phoenix, Tucson and Flagstaff), Tennessee, Missouri and Maryland, about 12 or 13 for Colorado, Alabama, South Carolina, Louisiana, and Kentucky. Note, I left Minnesota out because of the situation there where reps are excluded in a lot of places. They are the same population wise as the last few states listed so let's be optimistic and give them 8 reps. The states with about 1% of the country's population each - Oregon, Oklahoma, Connecticut, Iowa, Mississippi, Arkansas, Kansas, Utah and Nevada will each have about 8 reps. I bet in Nevada about 5 or 6 reps will be in and around Las Vegas and the other 3 will be up in the Reno - Carson City area. The remaining states, have less about 1/2 of 1% or less of the U.S. population so each of them will have between 2 to 4 reps each.
Note - a fair number of reps will have territories that cross state lines so this clouds the picture. Memphis, TN reps will have some territory in northern Mississippi and/or eastern Arkansas. Reps out of the New Orleans area or Mobile, AL, may cover the Mississippi gulf coast or maybe someone out of Jackson or Hattiesburg will cover the Biloxi-Gulfport area. It really all depends on how district lines are drawn.
One thing that is for certain is that there will be a lot more travel for many reps and some will have significant travel maybe for those in large western states with a low population density such as Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota and South Dakota.