Trade update for 6 months of 2008 (unaudited)08.08.2008 8 AUGUST 2008, MOSCOW – OAO Pharmacy Chain 36.6 [RTS: APTK; MICEX: RU14APTK1007] the leading Russian health and beauty retailer announces unaudited sales and operational results according to management accounts. Group sales- Y-o-Y in H1 2008 the Group’s consolidated sales increased by 46% and reached US$ 563.8 million. EMC has been divested in May 2008. The consolidated sales in H1 2008 without EMC amounted US$ 552.4 million*.
Sales by business unit- Sales in the retail unit grew by 50% and reached US$ 449.7 million.
- Sales of the production unit, Veropharm, reached US$ 86.5 million (annual growth 49%).
- Sales of other non-core businesses grew by 2.9%, including ELC sales growth of 128.6% (US$ 2.1 million).
| USD mln | Consolidated | Retail | Veropharm | EMC | ELC | Other |
|---|
| H1 2008 | 563.8 | 449.7 | 86.5 | 11.4 | 2.1 | 14.1 | | H1 2007 | 385.0 | 300.0 | 58.2 | 12.9 | 0.9 | 13.0 | | Change y-o-y | 46.4% | 49.9% | 48.7% | -11.8% | 128.6% | 8.7% |
|
Retail- As of the end of Q2 2008 Pharmacy Chain 36.6 operates 1 192 stores in 29 regions of Russia.
- During first 6 months of 2008, 38 pharmacies were opened organically, 71 closed, 7 rebranded and 1 reformatted.
- As of the end of Q2 2008 Pharmacy Chain 36.6 operates 10 ELC stores, 14 stand-alone optical outlets with 22 additional optical departments within pharmacies.
H1 2008 | Business Unit** | No. of Pharmacies | Share of Sales | Ave. retail space per
pharmacy, sq.m. |
|---|
| Moscow-Central | 402 | 44.4% | 73.4 | | including Northwest | 27 | 2.6% | 84.1 | | South Urals | 275 | 17.5% | 56.0 | | South | 203 | 16.0% | 50.7 | | Volga | 130 | 8.9% | 62.0 | | North Urals | 113 | 8.8% | 53.1 | | Siberia | 69 | 4.4% | 53.3 |
|
| | Company Total: | 1 192 | 100.0% | 61.2 |
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Operational data for retail unit- During 6 months of 2008, 53 million purchases were made in Pharmacy Chain 36.6 stores, which is 14% higher than in comparable period of 2007.
- Average check across the network reached USD 8.61, in Moscow USD 11.21 an increase over the comparable period of 18.6% and 9.4% respectively.
- Average sales floor size at the end of Q2 is 61.2 sq meters, a decrease of 2.4% versus 2007.
Like-For-Like sales in comparable storesAs of Q2 2008 the Company will start to provide the following L-F-L sales growth calculation to ensure better transparency on the performance of mature stores. The L-F-L reporting would be executed for a selection of comparable stores, which are: - opened or acquired 24 months from the current reporting period, and
- neither rebranded nor reformatted or somehow significantly changed during last 24 months, and
- not closed in the current reporting period.
As of the end of H1 2008 the company operates 406 comparable stores representing 45% of sales and 36% of traffic in the retail unit. The L-F-L sales growth in these stores in H1 2008 reached 16% as compared to H1 2007 while the traffic decreased by 5%: | Business Unit | Number of
comparable stores | L-F-L sales growth | Average check
growth |
|---|
| Moscow-Central | 152 | 14% | 15% | | Northwest | 19 | 40% | 31% | | South Urals | 120 | 14% | 31% | | South | 32 | 28% | 30% | | Volga | 71 | 20% | 29% | | North Urals | 1 | 7% | 36% | | Siberia | 11 | 36% | 46% |
|
| | Total: | 406 | 16% | 23% |
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* Hereinafter – these financial indicators may have significant variations from the consolidated data prepared in accordance with IFRS.
** Due to organizational changes Northwest is now managed by Moscow-Central. In addition, Urals is broken into two units North Urals and South Urals. | 
