President Chain Store Corp (PCSC, 統一超商), the nation’s top convenience store operator, aims to raise annual sales of its virtual business by 10 percent this year from last year are a result of the company’s resource integration of its online shopping portal 7net and pre-sale events at stores.
The company, which owns the 7-Eleven convenience store chain, saw its virtual business post about NT$2 billion (US$66.7 million) in sales last year, a tiny fraction of last year’s consolidated revenue of NT$200.61 billion, according to company statistics.
However, the company aims to raise the annual revenue of its virtual business to NT$2.2 billion this year, citing the positive effects of resource integration, after it merged the pre-sale business in its 5,005 physical outlets into the online shopping division — mainly the 7net business — in the second half of last year.
Photo: Ho Yu-hwa, Taipei Times
“The strategy of co-management should help the two businesses share resources, adopt joint marketing campaigns and lower costs,” 7net head Tsai Hung-chi (蔡弘琦) told a media briefing yesterday.
Tsai said sales at the company’s pre-sale events at its stores accounted for about 40 percent of total revenue generated from its virtual business. Revenue contributed by 7net accounted for the other 60 percent, with sales of fast food remaining at the top of the products sold.
President Chain has established a tradition over the past few years of launching pre-sale events based on different holidays and topics, with pre-sales of dishes for the Lunar New Year holiday showing the strongest demand, followed by the annual presale event for the Mid-Autumn Festival.
The company unveiled its annual “autumn crabs” presale event yesterday, aiming to generate at least NT$10 million in sales before the end of the event on Oct. 28, doubling the level of NT$6 million recorded during the same event last year.
It was the first time President Chain had introduced cooked crabs at the event, with the number of products sold doubling from last year, reaching 30 this year, Tsai added.
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