Jonas Marques acknowledges that, initially, he thought Pague Menos ()’s idea of inviting a professional who had been in the pharmaceutical industry for 30 years to take over a retail company was “crazy”. This wasn’t even the executive’s plan when he was formally invited by the company’s founders. At the time, Marques was in another time zone, holding a position as senior vice president at Bayer in Australia.
But if there was something he understood well, it was the change in strategy, something that is ongoing within Pague Menos. The company also wanted to put him in charge for the first time, to guarantee the perpetuity of the business. Marques, in turn, had experience in centuries-old companies on his resume. After all, as the executive makes a point of highlighting, the industry works with long cycles.
And so, the CEO, who had already been living outside Brazil for 8 years, returned to his homeland, Fortaleza (CE), after almost three decades. He exchanged multinationals for a family company, 100% Brazilian.
Digesting a mega acquisition
The moment of his arrival coincided with the final stretch of integration of Extrafarma, which Pague Menos purchased from Grupo Ultra () in 2021. It was already under his management that the stores under the acquired banner considerably improved their revenues, going from a average revenue from R$440 thousand to around R$600 thousand per month.
Performance is linked to a strategy that began to prioritize “opportunities for greater value capture” and established a set of missions to improve store operations.
Upon arriving at a company that for more than 40 years was run only by the founders and was still digesting a mega acquisition of 400 stores, Marques was faced with a structure in which the narratives were not so well aligned.
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“Each one had a different understanding of what was a priority for the company”, recalled the CEO, in an interview with InfoMoney.
Pague Menos is clear about what it wants to do next year: accelerate its expansion with new stores. “Next year, we will open more stores than in 2023 and 2024 combined”, says Marques. Considering that there were 30 this year and 20 in the past, there will be at least 50 in 2025.
Marques says he received a mandate for cautious expansion, without losing sight of the company’s commitment to deleveraging. The company’s ratio of net debt to Ebitda (an acronym in English for earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) ended the third quarter of this year at 2.4 times. Pague Menos’ objective is to bring the index closer to 2 by the end of 2024.
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“We are going to open as many stores as possible that respect this pace”, explains the executive.
A new strategy underway
Without giving details, Marques states that Pague Menos’ strategy is being revisited and the pension model is being reviewed.
“There are still places in Brazil where it is not only possible to achieve the IRR [taxa de retorno interno, métrica usada para medir a rentabilidade de um investimento]but it is also possible to have a higher average sales per store. And it is these locations that we are focusing on”, says the executive. “It is essential to open a store in the right place.”
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Meanwhile, the company continues working on the conversion of Extrafarma stores in states where the brand is most popular – Ceará, Maranhão, Amapá and Pará. Recently, 20 units were converted in these locations and sales at these points grew, on average, by 25 %. Recently, the conversions of another 20 stores were approved.
