The Indonesian konjac noodle brand Fitmee is making its low-calorie, zero-cholesterol and high-fibre konjac noodles more delicious with two new flavours – bolognese sauce and fried beef (goreng sapi).
Heavenly Blush, known for its yogurt drinks, has launched Yoguruto in PET bottle for added convenience. Yoguruto is currently in carton pack. By selling in PET bottle, Yoguruto can provide the added texture with nata de coco bits. The low-sugar, high-calcium and low-fat yogurt drinks (200ml) are available in grapefruit and passionfruit flavours.
Heavenly Blush has added two new flavours to its existing Greek Yogurt range, which offers a thicker and creamy texture with higher protein content. The two new flavours are strawberry and blueberry. The Greek Yogurt range is also available in spoonable version.
Indonesia’s PT Prima Lakto Sehat, the maker of Yoforia, has finally launched its new Crunch & Creamy Stirred Yogurt in the market. We first saw the product at SIAL Interfood 2019 in November 2019.
Yoforia Crunch & Creamy is described as “FunTasteThick!” “combined with creamy and thick yogurt.” The range consists of Honey Granola, Choco Granola, Cookies Crumb and Rainbow Crumb. They are now available at Yogya Supermarket and Superindo.
The interesting toppings make the new Yoforia Crunch & Creamy Stirred Yogurt unique in the market.
In Vietnam, the South Korean GS25 convenience store has joined the other foodservice players to introduce dragon fruit hamburger with bulgogi and cheese. ABC Bakery first debuted dragon fruit baguettes during the COVID-19 pandemic to support the country struggling to sell dragon fruit when trade with China was impacted by the outbreak. The trend has spread to fast food with giants like KFC and Lotteria launching their own dragon fruit hamburgers.
GS25 has meanwhile added a new artichoke drink with pomelo and roselle to provide vitamin C to help boost the body’s immune system.
Saigon-BinhTay Beer JSC (Sabibeco), an affiliate of the country’s biggest brewery Sabeco, has recently introduced the Malty range of alcohol-free malt drinks in Vietnam in early April 2020. Available in raspberry and lime, the alcohol-free drink targets consumers who want to enjoy refreshingly low/no alcohol drinks especially during summer.
The key ingredients in Malty Raspberry are water, malt, rice, hops, raspberry juice concentrate, orange juice concentrate and natural sweetener flavouring.
Malty offers an additional benefit of being low in calories, making it friendly to people with diabetes. The drink has no cholesterol and is rich in micronutrients to promote healthy body during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Heineken 0.0, which was first launched in Vietnam in mid-March 2020, has partnered with 7-Eleven Vietnam to encourage consumers to pair their food with the new non-alcoholic beer. The new Heineken 0.0 gives consumers a new choice for all times of the day. They can enjoy Heineken 0.0 right at work, at the gym, during lunchtime and even just before driving.
The collaboration with the convenience store saw the giving away of Heineken 0.0 for every purchase of selected hot pot ingredients including sauces and Tomyum hotpot ingredients with meat slices targeting at-home consumption.
As more consumers now eating at home due to the pandemic, positioning Heineken 0.0 for at-home celebration helps to create a new occasion for Heineken 0.0 in Vietnam, where the consumption of non-alcoholic beer is still a relatively new concept. Vietnam’s new drunk driving law effective 1 January 2020 will be a major catalyst to encourage consumers to remain sober.
7-Eleven Vietnam has introduced a local dessert menu that is perfect for summer. The new chè khúc bạch or almond panna cotta jelly is priced at VND 18,000. The convenience store chain is currently selling pennywort juice and wintermelon drink in addition to milk tea, coffee and juice drinks.
The convenience store chain has teamed up with be Đi Chợ app of the Vietnamese ride-hailing provider beBike to allow consumers order 7-Eleven food and drinks through the third-party app. This will serve as an alternative to the official site at www.7now.vn.
To reach out to digitally-native consumers who are also value seekers, 7-Eleven Vietnam has collaborated with Shopback to offer customers a percentage of their purchase money each time they make a transaction on https://app.shopback.com/7eleven-sb.
7-Eleven Vietnam has made available fresh vegetables and chilled/frozen meat at participating outlets as the convenience store doubled as a place to sell fresh produce.
The limited edition Haitai Honey Butter Chip Wedding Cake Flavor is now available at 7-Eleven. The price is RM 6.50 per pack. Click here for the list of participating stores. Haitai is popularly known for its honey butter chip.
Chocolates
New chocolate products launched at 7-Eleven in May 2020 included Belgium’s finest Godiva Masterpieces Chocolate in dark chocolate and milk chocolate flavours, Beryls Mini Camior in almond and pralines as well as Nestle Damak Chocolate and Nestle Damak Gece.
Ice cream
Consumers can try Walls Magnum Cherry Blossoms ice cream and Walls Lipton Teh Tarik Sandwich. The Walls Durian Mochi Ice Cream is back and is available nationwide.
Beverages
The immunity-boosting drink You.C1000 vitamin drinks come in orange, lemon and apple flavours. To beat the heat from this scorching hot weather, consumers can opt for the new Xiao Chun Chun herbal drink.
The exclusive BTS special packaged coffee with 14 designs is now available at 7-Eleven stores in Peninsular Malaysia. Each cup of coffee costs RM 11.90 and boasts a striking black and gold design. “BTS Special Package Cold Brew Americano 270ml” comes in a mysterious black cup whereas the “BTS Special Package Hot Brew Vanilla Latte 270ml” comes in a striking gold cup.
Snacks
Some of the selected imported snacks launched in May 2020 included the King’s Deli potato crisps in sea salt and cheese flavours and Safari Potato Grills in cheese, salt and salt and vinegar flavours. Herr’s Jalapeno Flavoured Cheese Curls, Baked Cheese Curls and Carolina Reaper, which is the hottest pepper around, are new additions to 7-Eleven.
Other releases included the Korean Yopokki Snack in hot & spicy and cheese flavours and the El Sabor Nacho Chips made from non-genetically modified corn from Greece. The tasty and healthy vegan snacks with Eat Real Snacks are free from all 14 declarable allergens. The range comprises Quinoa Chips, Hummus Chips, Cheezie Straws and Lentil Chips.
Biscuits
The new biscuits are Mamee Monster Thin Thin in three delicious flavours – spicy fried chicken, sour cream & onion and milk and the New Zealand-made Snax Crunches in cheese & onion and sour cream & chives flavours.
Sales grew RM35.6m or 6.1% to 619.3m • Positive SSSG at 1.9% • PAT grew 1.9% despite RM8.6m cost incurred on corporate exercise • Opened 34 new stores for the quarter, bringing the total network to 2,419 stores
Comments from Chief Executive Officer – Colin Harvey
We continue achieving significant improvement in our revenue and net profit for the 1st Quarter of 2020 by 6.1% and 78.6% (excluding corporate exercise expense) respectively YOY. Our strategy roadmap of strengthening assortment, supply chain, operational excellence, store base and digitally enabling the organization continues to bear fruit and despite challenging conditions ahead due to the Covid-19 pandemic, our continuous discipline in executing our strategy roadmap as well as leveraging and seeking out opportunities from our recent corporate acquisitions whilst remaining flexible to adapt to market changes shall ensure that 7-Eleven remains as the nation’s preferred convenience store choice.
Review of Current Quarter Performance versus Corresponding Quarter Last Year
The Group’s revenue for the current quarter grew by RM35.6 million or 6.1% to RM619.3 million. The growth in revenue continued to be driven by the growth in new stores, higher same store sales and better consumer promotion activity. Revenue from fresh food and tobacco segment grew more than 13% and 7% respectively.
Gross profit improved by RM9.5 million or 5.2% to RM192.5 million. This was mainly attributed to the increase in revenue and improved logistics expenses recovery. Other operating income increased by RM4.9 million or 17.2% driven by increase in marketing income.
Selling and distribution expenses for the quarter increased by RM0.7 million or 0.4% driven by new store expansion resulting in higher utilities and rental expenses, partially offset by lower inventory shrinkages.
Administrative and other operating expenses increased by RM9.8 million or 38.3%. This was mainly attributed to RM5.9 million incurred due to corporate exercise in acquiring Caring Pharmacy Group Berhad, higher software maintenance cost and fixed asset written off.
The Group recorded a profit after tax of RM11.4 million, an increase of RM0.2 million or 1.9%. Excluding the cost incurred in the corporate exercise, the Group would have achieved profit after tax of RM20.0 million, an increase of RM8.8 million or 78.6%.
Future Prospects
The Group’s performance is affected by Covid-19 pandemic as our stores in the malls are closed while others are operating under restricted hours during the Movement Control Order. While it is difficult to ascertain changes in consumer behaviour and how the economy will recover, we will continue to explore opportunities for growth in other channels and innovate in our product offerings. We will also continue to focus on our customer’s needs, pursuing our core strategy pillars of Operational Excellence, Cost Management and Commercial Innovation, at the same time refreshing the 7-Eleven brand in the mind of customers though refreshed stores, innovations in our pricing, promotions, and developing exciting products.
Although the recent study has reported that COVID-19 impacted the global smartphone market, however, smartphone brands like Apple, OnePlus, Xiaomi, Oppo, Huawei, and Honor recently unveiled their latest smartphones to tap the hidden potential of the current market.
The data indicates that some smartphone brands were experiencing low search interests, but not all equally. For instance, Huawei Nova 7 saw an average drop in search interest by 45% as compared to its previous model before the pandemic struct. Meanwhile, Honor 30 & Oppo Reno Ace 2 also experienced a decrease of search interest by 80% and 93% respectively.
As the outbreak continues, it could also cause some notable changes standing in the smartphone market such as iPhone SE.
iPhone SE remained resilient even during this unprecedented time as it has the highest demand amongst other smartphones released in April across 7 countries. Even during the lockdown period, the search interest for “iPhone SE” shot up to 206%. It was three times higher than iPhone 11 Pro when the phone was first released in September last year.
OnePlus 8 & 8 Pro were in the 2nd slot dominating in countries like Singapore, Malaysia, The Philippines, Thailand, and Hongkong. While the 3rd place had taken up by Mi 10 of Xiaomi that held 7% of the search market share from March to April.
Overall, iPhone SE was the most sought smartphone in the region, accounting for an average of 673,000 searches from March to April. This also shows a high demand for the phone during this global pandemic.
iPrice saw that the proportions of searches for iPhone SE have acquired almost 78% amongst the other smartphone brands. One of many factors that led to a higher number of demands for iPhone SE was its mid-range price bracket that starting from $399 (USD).
It offers a cheaper price range than the other smartphones. The phone also provides a longer lifetime as you will continue to get critical security updates and new features via iOS version updates.
In Singapore, the raising of smartphone usage due to the latest measures to control the outbreak of COVID-19 until June 1st probably piqued people’s interest in this joined budget and specs.
We collected Google Keyword Planner search behaviour data based on the keywords “iPhone SE,” “OnePlus,” “OnePlus 8 Pro,” “Mi 10,” “Huawei 7,” “Honor 30,” “Honor 30 Pro,” and “Oppo Reno Ace 2” from 7 Southeast Asian countries available in iPrice. Data was collected from March – April. Data on the previous models were obtained from one month after its released date in 2019.
About iPrice Group
iPrice Group is a meta-search website operating in seven countries across Southeast Asia namely in; MalaysiaSingapore, Indonesia, Thailand, Philippines, Vietnam, and HongKong. Currently, iPrice compares and catalogues more than 500 million products and receives close to 20 million monthly visits across the region. iPrice currently operates three business lines: price comparison for electronics and health & beauty; product discovery for fashion and home & living; and coupons across all verticals
