Raia Drogasil reaches thousand shops with around the Northeast

In a few months, the streak Drogasil, the country's biggest pharmacy retailer created three years ago, will open the first units in the States of Pernambuco, Alagoas and Sergipe. In the capital of Pernambuco, Drogasil will open next week and, with it, the company will become the second publicly traded retailer with more than thousand own points in the country. Only the Grupo Pão de Açúcar have this volume of shops. In addition, by up to a year and a half, the first distribution center opens in Northeast, informed the network Value.
This is the back of investments in other States in the region, after the opening of units in Bahia in 2012. Since then, the company, which faced a restructuring after merger of Streak and hadn't advanced Drogasil, in the Northeast. The plan is open this year from 20 to 25 points in the region (including Bahia). This market is headed by Payless, network expansion in the Southeast has intensified in recent years. In the country, the expectation of Drogasil Streak is over 130 units in the year-were 131 inaugurations in 2013.
The new distribution center should be located in Salvador or Reef, according to Kwesi Pousada, President of the company. And can be rented or built in the model "build to suit" (mounted with partner in contract previously agreed). Still no prediction of amount to be invested. The streak Drogasil has seven distribution centers in the country.
In Bahia, are 16 drug stores served by the distribution center in Aparecida de Goiânia (GO), 1.7 km of Salvador. With greater presence in the area, the company believes that the time has come to strengthen the local distribution, said Eugenio De Zagottis, Director of investor relations and corporate planning.
The company disposes of impacts of business expansion in the northeast in gross margin, said Zagottis. "We didn't realize greater pressure on margin in stores when you go in the State of Bahia. It is possible to feel something at the beginning of the activity in some places, but it's temporary, "said Zagottis yesterday, after the publication of first-quarter balance sheet. The streak Drogasil doubled net profit in the first quarter, to $ 29.1 million, and net revenues increased 19.5%, reaching R $ 1.66 billion. Gross margin was 26.9%, growth of 0.3 percentage point, reported yesterday in the balance sheet.
The company also begins to open units in airports. A pharmacy will be installed at terminal 3 from the international airport of Guarulhos (SP), with the mark Lane, and at the airport of Viracopos in Campinas (SP), with the brand Drogasil. The points will have price positioning of "good shopping stores," said Inn.
For 2014, the 130 planned openings, contracts were signed for 90 points so far. "It is not true that we closed 24 units in 2013 to a total of 131 openings. Closed 24 in a sum of more than 900 points that we have, "said Zagottis, to rebut criticism from rivals that the network opens but closes a lot of pharmacy.
"We did almost r $ 1 billion in gross sales in 2013, double the revenues of international network which entered in Brazil. That's bigger sale generating gains of scale, "says Zagottis. The American CVS acquired Onofre a year ago, network of almost $ 500 million in sales at the time.
Asked about the possibility of selling control to foreign networks, Zagottis says that the group "will follow the lives of independently". "The only advantage you can have with the foreign shops is access to capital. The brands, consumer knowledge and ' expertise ' on purchases are all locations. Not even the importation of generics is possible, because you can't bring this medicine out. And we have ability to invest, to generate cash and to raise capital, "said the Director.
The company completed the unification of their corporate systems (payroll, accounting, among others) on 28 February. By the end of 2014, the network integrates the system of boxes. With that done, the integration is complete. "We started to enjoy the best of the Streak on Drogasil and Drogasil on Streak," said Zagottis.