Not just cosmetic changes

But this is now set to change...

Yes, it is. We are planning to open our next few shops. Some will probably be opened through acquisitions. We have already worked out the ideal format for our chemist stores – they would have areas of 150–180 sqm. These are the outlets we want to open.

Why is this size the most suitable?

This is what our concept is like. Such a store includes the full range of products customers are looking for and at the same time these outlets generate the best results in many respects. We have already tried them out in larger cities, but we mostly want to expand into small and medium-sized towns. Dayli is not yet as recognisable a brand as the market leaders and in the larger conurbations, where the choice of drugstores is much broader, brand awareness is of great importance. We are building the Dayli brand all the time through our marketing activities. In smaller towns it is easier for us to raise awareness among female customers. And the
competition is completely different. In the case of large cities, which include shopping centres and retail parks, a female customer also uses other chemist stores, including the premium sector. In smaller towns franchise pharmacies are very popular but they don’t operate in large cities for various reasons. We know that small and medium-sized towns are the places where we want to develop, but we have not ruled out large conurbations, particularly on estates, where such a chemist is very convenient for female customers. And the majority of our customers are women.

And what about Marszałkowska in Warsaw? This does not fit into that strategy.

It is a high street location, in the centre of a large city, where there is a very large flow of people and not only local ones. Even though we have a few other stores in Warsaw’s residential estates, Marszałkowska is the outlet that has undergone the greatest evolution over the last year and it is one we are always studying closely. Our strategy continues to evolve.

And what about the local competition nearby? There is a Rossmann on the other side of the street.

The competition is always there. It is actually just opposite, but this is not the only case when we have had a market leader on the other side of the street. There are quite a few such situations in smaller towns. We have shops in towns with 5,000, 10,000 and 15,000 inhabitants and 80 pct of our chain is located in towns with up to 40,000 inhabitants. And in the case of smaller towns the retail is still concentrated in the town centres. If there is no pharmacy market leader, then there are two or three franchise chemists on the same street, so we virtually never function on our own.

And what about shopping centres?

We will not be entering large malls, but retail parks as well as residential estates and the centres of smaller towns are very much within our sphere of interest.

What is the number of inhabitants in towns that most interests you?

It depends. If we opt for a given location, we survey the competition, whether there truly is room for such a pharmacy and whether it will have customers there. There is no point opening something according to a pattern, so each location is analysed separately. Apart from the expansion department any analysis also involves the sales department. I cannot say that, for instance, I will not open another store in Warsaw. If there is a location there that interests us, we will open another outlet.

A store has also opened on the main street of Szczecin, which is a larger city and does not fit in with the strategy.

Dayli stores operate on the basis of the Schlecker chemist chain we acquired, which was established in Poland in 2004. We started from the acquisition of the chain in 2012 with its locations, and some leasing contracts last ten years. Of course, such a drugstore can sometimes differ from the strategy we have now, and the market changes. We are going to phase some locations out and open others.

Do you not have the need to build warehouses in the most important regions to enable one-day delivery?

We already have one-day delivery. Goods leave the warehouse in the afternoon and they are in the shop the next morning. So the delivery never exceeds 24 hours. This is absolutely perfect considering the store locations we have.

Is there much storage space in your outlets?

Each shop has a chemical and food warehouse. There are back rooms for storing goods and deliveries take place once a week, so there is enough space on the shelves not to have to store goods in a warehouse. We store larger products and the fast moving ones such as toilet paper, kitchen towels as well as shampoos, shower gels and nappies.