Hong Kong Billionaire's Stores Make Profit Margins Amazon Could Only Dream Of
- Watson plans to open 1,400 stores, many of them in China
- Chinese stores take less than year to recoup investments
Li Ka-Shing's Empire May Be at Risk From Brexit
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Who says brick-and-mortar retail is dead? Billionaire Li Ka-shing’s A.S. Watson Group is opening nearly four stores a day because selling baby and skin-care products in China is generating profit margins that Amazon.com Inc. could only dream of.
The operator of the Watsons health-and-beauty stores and Superdrug chain plans to open 1,400 outlets globally this year, more than a third of which will be in China, Chief Operating Officer Malina Ngai said in an interview. Demand is so high in the mainland that the CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd. unit takes less than a year, on average, to earn back the investment it makes to open a store there, she said.