Nanpai Information: On May 14, 2024, Beijing time, MINISO Group (NYSE: MNSO, HKEX: 9896) announced its financial results for the first quarter of 2024. During the quarter, MINISO Group continued its high-quality development trend, with a steady increase in overall revenue, a number of operating indicators such as gross profit margin and net new stores reaching record highs, and remarkable results in the upgrading of its global brand strategy.
According to the financial report, the company's total revenue in the first quarter increased by 26% year-on-year to 3.72 billion yuan, breaking through a new high in the first quarter. Thanks to the increase in the proportion of overseas revenue and the optimization of TOP TOY's gross profit margin, MINISO's gross profit margin in the quarter was 43.4%, an increase of 4.1 percentage points year-on-year, once again hitting a record high. In terms of profitability, the non-IFRS adjusted net profit margin was 16.6% in the first quarter; Adjusted net profit was RMB620 million, up 28% year-on-year.
As of March 31, 2024, the number of MINISO stores worldwide has reached 6,630, including 4,034 domestic stores and 2,596 overseas stores. At the store opening level, there were 217 net new stores in the quarter, breaking the record for opening stores in the first quarter since the beginning of history.
In the domestic market, MINISO's domestic revenue in the quarter was 2.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 16%. With its unique IP consumption scene experience, MINISO's "super store" has become an important engine for brand performance growth. On March 18, the newly opened flagship stores of MINISO Beijing Wukesong and Hopson Hui both covered an area of more than 400 square meters, continuing the innovative expression of "super IP" + "super store" in space design, further deepening the brand's positioning as a "global IP co-branded collection store" and bringing consumers an immersive shopping experience.
With the outstanding performance of "super stores" in the domestic business, MINISO has accelerated its global layout, and the market performance of overseas stores has also become the main driving force for overseas revenue. In May 2023, MINISO opened its first global flagship store in Times Square, New York, becoming the "first Chinese brand to enter Times Square, New York, USA", with sales exceeding 550,000 yuan on the first day of opening and a monthly revenue of nearly 10 million yuan. In less than a year, MINISO's New York Times Square pop-up store once again created a business sample to meet the super consumer demand of the American market with the ultimate cost-effective IP products. During the quarter, MINISO successively opened IP co-branded stores in Malaysia, Vietnam and other markets, and continued to intensively cultivate high-potential stores.
The data shows that the competitiveness of overseas markets has been significantly improved and continues to become an important growth point. In the first quarter, the single-quarter revenue of MINISO's overseas business exceeded 1.2 billion, achieving a year-on-year growth rate of 53%. In particular, the revenue of the direct market increased by more than 92% year-on-year, and has achieved a year-on-year growth of more than 80% for four consecutive quarters, and the direct market accounted for 58% of the overseas revenue, with both year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter growth.
This quarter, as the first Chinese brand to cooperate with Chiikawa IP, MINISO co-branded "New Top Stream" Chiikawa was launched for the first time in China, covering hundreds of co-branded products such as plush dolls, daily necessities, and bag accessories, triggering a phenomenal consumption boom. Chiikawa x Miniso-themed pop-up stores have been launched in Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou and other cities, which have long been crowded by young people. Ye Guofu, Chairman of the Board and CEO of MINISO (Group), said that this collaboration can be summed up in five "unprecedented": unprecedented performance, unprecedented speed, unprecedented efficiency, unprecedented courage, and unprecedented enthusiasm of Chiikawa fans.
In addition, on the occasion of the 65th anniversary of Barbie's IP, MINISO once again joined hands with old friends to create MINISO × Barbie's 65th anniversary of the country's first float parade "Sister and Sister Powder to the Sky", which not only deeply rooted in the hearts of the people in terms of visual aesthetics, but also aroused strong resonance among young users at the emotional level.
IP co-branding is a booster for stimulating consumption, as well as a starting point for product innovation and content construction. Judging from the performance of the data, the sales of IP products in the first quarter accounted for 26%. Among them, domestic IP products account for about a quarter, and the proportion of overseas IP has increased significantly to more than 40% year-on-year, and MINISO is steadily moving towards the goal of 50% of IP sales in 2028.
MINISO is the world's first IP co-branded collection store, which opens the era of inclusive IP with high cost performance, breaks the barrier and inherent cognition of "IP equals expensive price", and turns IP consumption into mass consumption, which is a subversion and innovation at the commercial level, as well as the innovative development of Chinese brands. Up to now, MINISO has reached in-depth cooperation with more than 100 world-renowned IPs such as Disney, Sanrio, Pokémon, Jurassic, Palace Museum Culture, Barbie, Loopy, etc., further strengthening the perception of "MINISO = co-branded boss".
MINISO's TOP TOY continued to make efforts in product innovation and store upgrades, and achieved strong growth in performance. According to the financial report, as of March 31, the number of TOP TOY stores has reached 160, covering nearly 70 cities across the country. In terms of performance, TOP TOY's revenue in the quarter reached 210 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 55%, a record high.
In terms of product innovation and upgrading, TOP TOY has driven the improvement of the overall gross profit level through the growth of the gross profit margin and sales proportion of its own brand products such as exclusive blind boxes and building blocks. These include new products such as the Kuromi Witch's Festival series of figures, Disney's Stitch's Funny Diary series figures, and the space-time Yuanlong creative building blocks. These new products performed well in the market, and nearly 60,000 Kulomi Witch figures were sold in 10 days after they were listed, and the performance of May Day increased by 48% year-on-year; The performance of Stitch figure on the first 3 days was as high as 1.28 million, becoming the top seller list, with a total performance of nearly 5 million; The space-time dragon building block has also achieved good sales, with a total of 30,000 sales so far, becoming a landmark original product of China's building block trend.
At a time when consumers are paying more and more attention to experience, TOP TOY has entered the leading business districts such as Shanghai Nanjing Road Pedestrian Street, Shanghai Jing'an Joy City, and Zhejiang Ningbo Tianyi Square Store, continuing to create more diverse trendy toy experiences for consumers, and seizing users' minds through innovative user experience and word-of-mouth.
Ye Guofu said, "2024 is a new starting point for the five-year development plan of MINISO. The trend of the times determines that China will give birth to a number of world-class consumer brands, and the goal of MINISO is to take advantage of the trend and become a super brand. MINISO will continue to be committed to building the world's No. 1 IP design retail group, focusing on IP strategy, adhering to cost-effectiveness, globalization and product innovation, and constantly launching more good-looking, fun and easy-to-use products to expand the global market. With full patience and perseverance, we will continue to adhere to the long-term principle, step by step, and steadily implement the development goals for the next five years. ”