Major South African pharmacy chain rolling out more stores

Dis-Chem reported a strong financial performance for its 2025 financial year, with plans to roll out more stores in the 2026 financial year.

Dis-Chem is one of South Africa’s biggest pharmacy chains, with stores in Namibia, Botswana, and South Africa.

On Friday, 30 May 2025, Dis-Chem released its results for the year ended 28 February 2025, which revealed a strong performance.

The group’s revenue increased by 8.0% to R39.2 billion, largely driven by 5.9% growth in retail revenue to R33.6 billion, with comparable pharmacy store revenue growth at 4.1%. 

Net store changes included the opening of 20, closure of 3 retail pharmacy stores and nine baby store closures, resulting in a footprint of 285 retail pharmacy stores and 45 retail baby stores at year-end.

The retailer’s wholesale revenue grew by 9.9% to R30.1 billion. Wholesale revenue to the company’s own retail stores, still the biggest contributor, rose by 7.4%.

This saw the company’s total income grow by 9.2% to R12.1 billion, with the group’s total income margin being 31% compared to 30.7% in the prior comparative period.

Retail total income grew by 7.9%, with Dis-Chem’s retail margin increasing from 29.7% to 30.3% over the comparable period. 

The company explained that the increase in retail total income margin was predominantly due to an increase in transactional gross margin across dispensary, personal care, beauty and healthcare.

Dis-Chem’s basic earnings per share and basic headline earnings per share were 137.6 cents and 137.5 cents per share, respectively, an increase of 20.0%.

In its 2025 financial year, Dis-Chem’s expenses grew by 7.5%, with retail costs up 6.8% as the group invested in new stores. 

Retail employment costs, which account for 54.6% of total retail expenses, increased by 6.4%.

Notably, the company’s like-for-like retail employee costs decreased by 0.2%, following the successful implementation of a new staffing framework.

This new framework places emphasis on achieving a consistent and optimal mix of staff to ensure stores run efficiently and without compromising differentiated service levels.

Dis-Chem’s wholesale expenses also grew significantly, by 11.1%, mainly due to the acquisition of its Longmeadow warehouse in the prior period. 

Excluding the additional costs incurred for the Longmeadow warehouse, wholesale expenses grew by 9.0%.

The acquisition of two warehouses also saw Dis-Chem’s net financing costs increase by 11.5% from the prior comparable period. 

The company took out a R650 million loan facility in FY 2025 to fund the acquisition of its Midrand warehouse, and another R502 million facility in the prior period for its Longmeadow warehouse property.

Looking forward, Dis-Chem expects to continue accelerating its space identification and new store openings to achieve its three-year target of 137,000m².

Including the 9 stores already trading in FY2026, 39 retail pharmacy stores are planned for the year.

Dis-Chem declared a gross final cash dividend of 27.85 cents per share, an increase of 23.8% from the prior comparable period.