Dis-Chem is the second-largest

retail Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is the sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholes ...

pharmacy Pharmacy is the science and practice of discovering, producing, preparing, dispensing, reviewing and monitoring medications, aiming to ensure the safe, effective, and affordable use of medication, medicines. It is a miscellaneous science as it ...

chain in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

, operating 173 stores across

Southern Africa Southern Africa is the southernmost region of Africa. No definition is agreed upon, but some groupings include the United Nations geoscheme for Africa, United Nations geoscheme, the intergovernmental Southern African Development Community, and ...

. Dis-Chem sells both third party and

private label A private label, also called a private brand or private-label brand, is a brand owned by a company, offered by that company alongside and competing with brands from other businesses. A private-label brand is almost always offered exclusively by th ...

products in stores and online, and operates a wholesale division.

History

Dis-Chem started in 1978 when pharmacists Ivan and Lynette Saltzman, opened their first retail pharmacy in Mondeor, a southern suburb of

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...

. They introduced the concept of a discount pharmacy with product categories that until then, had not been offered in South African pharmacies because of prohibiting legislation. In 2014, Dis-Chem opened its first store outside South Africa, in

Windhoek Windhoek (; ; ) is the capital and largest city of Namibia. It is located in central Namibia in the Khomas Highland plateau area, at around above sea level, almost exactly at the country's geographical centre. The population of Windhoek, which ...

Namibia Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country on the west coast of Southern Africa. Its borders include the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south; in the no ...

. In November 2016, Dis-Chem Pharmacies Limited group listed 27.5% of its listed share capital on the

Johannesburg Stock Exchange JSE Limited (previously the JSE Securities Exchange and the Johannesburg Stock Exchange) is the largest stock exchange in Africa. It is located in Sandton, Johannesburg, South Africa, after it moved from downtown Johannesburg in 2000. In 2003 ...

. It was the second-largest

IPO An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...

in the exchange's history."About Dis-Chem"
Dis-Chem website, accessed 9 July 2020 In 2016, the company announced its plans to double its number of outlets through 2021. At the time, one-third of its stores were less than 3 years old.

Criticism

In July 2020, the Competition Commission of South Africa found Dis-Chem guilty of inflating prices of certain hygiene products, such as disposable face masks, during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

References

{{Witwatersrand companies Pharmacy brands Retail companies of South Africa Companies based in Johannesburg