E-commerce will change the future of drug retail

Source: on the morning of November 7, 2014, the 21st century drugstore, Zong Yungang, deputy director of CFDA South pharmaceutical Economic Research Institute, published a theme report entitled "2014 Research Report on the development of China's pharmaceutical retail market", analyzed the new normal of current pharmaceutical retail business, and predicted that e-commerce will become an important force affecting the future of pharmaceutical retail In the theme report, Zong Yungang analyzed the current situation of drug retail market According to Zong Yungang, the number of retail pharmacies has reached the lower limit In 2013, the average number of retail pharmacies in China was 2901, with 3570 chain pharmacies The total number of single chain stores was 158000, with a chain rate of 36.6% The low level of public satisfaction hinders the improvement of the flow of customers In 2013, the comprehensive satisfaction of retail chain drugstores decreased to 48.04%, while that of retail single drugstores increased, but it was still only 14.32% Online shopping also decreased, only 1.89% The reasons for the low satisfaction of consumers are as follows: not being able to buy the designated drugs (45%), less drug selectivity (38%), poor professional guidance of staff (37%), high drug price (31%), poor service attitude (16%) For the factors considered by consumers when purchasing drugs, Zong Yungang pointed out that the public now pays more attention to the essence of drug quality, which is the performance of rapid promotion of drug brand attention and return of brand value The internal quality indexes of drugs, such as drug instructions, are the key factors for consumers to consider when purchasing drugs, and the validity period and manufacturer's factors are also improved The categories of drugs purchased by the public are mainly acute, while the diseases purchased by consumers in retail pharmacies are mainly acute common diseases, with little difference between ages The purchase of chronic diseases is mainly concentrated in the elderly The growth rate of drug sales continues to slow down Zong Yungang mentioned in the report that the growth rate of drug sales continues to slow down From the drugstore samples taken by the drug retail analysis system [RDM] of Nanfang Institute, except for the rise of proprietary Chinese medicine from 9.6% in 2013 to 10.3% in 2014, the rest has declined, among which the sales of devices have declined from 26.9% to 7.7%, the largest decline From a regional perspective, the growth rate of the first and second tier cities is limited due to population, policy and community competition factors, and the market potential of the third and fourth tier cities is large Under the influence of policy wrestling and medical insurance, the growth rate of drugs is significantly lower than that of non drugs In addition, the proportion of drug sales remained low In 2009, the proportion of drugs (including chemical drugs and Chinese patent medicines) was 72%, in 2013, it dropped to 70.38%, and in the first half of 2014, it was 70.50% The Internet of drugstores will break the inherent business form in the context of the continuous downturn in the development of drug terminal market, and the development of online drugstores is particularly noticeable Zong believes that the rapid development of the Internet has changed the way consumers buy drugs, and e-commerce may be able to change the future of drug retail At present, the development of e-commerce has the advantages of time, place and people The scale of Internet users has reached 591 million, the number of mobile Internet users is 464 million, and the Internet penetration rate has reached 45% Among them, 271 million are shopping Internet users, and the use rate of online shopping has increased to 46% Zong Yungang said that the drugstore business circle will be infinitely enlarged when the conditions are available The Internet sales mode of drugstores will completely break the business mode of the inherent business circle, and the sales radius will be extended infinitely According to the characteristics of different categories and the characteristics of the seller's purchase, the commonly used emergency drugs are still dominated by the inherent business district; the slow disease category extends within the small area; the health care function category extends within the large area; the drugstores with exclusive varieties can extend to the whole country with the help of the Internet For the drugstore market in 2015, Zong Yungang predicted that the growth rate of the drug retail market would further slow down, with the growth rate falling to within 10% (predicted 9.3% - 9.7%) In terms of business form, the growth rate of physical drugstores may show a turning point of decline, the number of drugstores in the first tier cities will decline, and the number of drugstores in the second and third tier cities will tend to be saturated; industrial enterprises will have more attempts and improvements with the direct sale mode of online drugstores In terms of categories, the sales proportion of pharmaceutical preparations (Chinese patent medicine of chemical and biological preparations) has further declined; the sales proportion of chronic diseases in physical pharmacies has further declined; the sales proportion of e-commerce prescription drugs (chronic diseases) will be rapidly released after lifting the ban.