Australian retail chain Chemist Warehouse is hoping to grow its market share in China and Southeast Asia by renewing its strategic partnership with Tmall Global for another two years.
As part of the new deal, Chemist Warehouse will add more stores across Alibaba’s e-commerce marketplace, including one on its recently acquired cross-border marketplace Kaola, and three multi-brand stores on Tmall Global under My Chemist, My Beauty Spot and Discount Vitamin Warehouse.
The retailer will also open a store on Alibaba’s Lazada marketplace to extend its reach to consumers in Malaysia and Singapore.
“Since the previous deal signed two years ago, we have worked in partnership with the company to successfully grow their brand awareness in China. As Chemist Warehouse’s partnership with Alibaba matures, today’s agreement will see the company open additional stores and work with us on a range of new and exciting marketing initiatives,” Maggie Zhou, managing director of Alibaba Group in Australia and New Zealand said.
The agreement will also focus on providing easier market access and support for a number of smaller and medium brands.
“We are thrilled to sign this agreement and commit to a further two years of strategic cooperation with Alibaba Group,” Nancy Jian, chief executive of Chemist Warehouse China said on Tuesday.
“The opportunities to grow our business in China and Southeast Asia are second to none and Alibaba is an integral part of our overall growth strategy.”
Chemist Warehouse first collaborated with Alibaba’s cross-border business-to-consumer marketplace in 2015 and is now the number one cross-border store on the site.
Zhou told Internet Retailing last month that Australia’s clean image is key to success of retailers and brands in China.
“I think the prevalence of those products [is due to] Australia having a strong country image – clean, natural, those kinds of things are very attractive to the Chinese consumer,” Zhou said. “So for things to eat, to drink, to use on your skin, [Australian products] are really well thought of by the Chinese consumer.”
Zhou also said Chinese consumers associate Australia with health, and supplements in particular are a strong segment.
“It’s not only one brand of supplements doing well, it’s a group of them. The top five brands from around the world, two of them are supplements, and they’re all from Australia,” she said.
In 2015, having just opened the first store on Tmall Global, Chemist Warehouse became the first cross-border retailer in the world to achieve 10m RMB (AUD2.1m) in Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) during Alibaba’s annual 11:11 Global Shopping Festival. The store currently stocks more than 200 brands and over 3200 Stock Keeping Units (SKUs).
This story originally appeared on Inside FMCG.
