In the first half of this year, the revenue of TongRenTang, a Chinese time-honored brand and Beijing Tongrentang Co., Ltd., decreased by 14.23% compared to the same period last year. The net profit attributable to the shareholders of the listed company also dropped by 23.19%, indicating a decline in both revenue and net profit. This marks a continued decrease in net profit for the company. By the end of June this year, TongRenTang had closed 42 stores.
According to the “2026 Interim Report” released by TongRenTang on August 31, the operating income was 8.379 billion yuan, a decrease of 14.23% year-on-year. The total profit was 1.1796 billion yuan, down 26.85% year-on-year. The net profit attributable to the shareholders of the listed company was 726.2 million yuan, a decrease of 23.19% year-on-year. The net profit attributable to the shareholders of the listed company after deducting non-recurring gains and losses was 713.3 million yuan, down 24.3% year-on-year.
The announcement attributed the decline in operating income to factors such as changes in the overall consumption environment and pressures faced in pharmaceutical retail, leading to a decrease in overall sales revenue during the reporting period.
The Financial Weekly, a publication under Shanghai Financial Weekly Media Co., Ltd., noted that TongRenTang’s consecutive decline in net profit marks a challenging period for this century-old brand, with its core indicators of revenue, profit, and cash flow all showing double-digit declines simultaneously. The financial scale and quality of TongRenTang have visibly shrunk. In the first half of this year, the company’s total profit was 1.18 billion yuan, a 26.85% decrease compared to the previous year, showing a larger decline in profit than in revenue (-14.23%), indicating significant pressure on the profit side. As the revenue scale decreased, gross profit margin and return on investment also declined simultaneously, signifying a reduction not only in sales volume but also in per-unit profit margin.
The Financial Weekly highlighted that the worsening trend in quarterly performance is particularly concerning. In the first quarter, the net profit attributable to the parent company was 471 million yuan, a 19.07% decrease year-on-year. In the second quarter, the quarterly net profit plummeted to 255 million yuan, a 29.80% decrease year-on-year. Looking at the annual reports, TongRenTang’s net profit has been declining for several years. In 2023, the net profit was 1.669 billion yuan, which dropped to 1.526 billion yuan in 2024 (a decrease of 8.54% compared to the previous year) and further decreased to 1.189 billion yuan in 2025 (a significant drop of 22.07%, the largest decline in nearly a decade). In the first half of 2026, the net profit amounted to 726 million yuan, down by 23.19% compared to the previous year.
Furthermore, the total revenue in 2025 was 17.256 billion yuan, a 7.21% decrease year-on-year, marking the first decline in nearly five years.
The Financial Weekly pointed out that TongRenTang’s decline in mid-year performance is the result of a combination of factors, including the peak of product cycles, high channel inventory, tightening price control, and increased industry supervision.
As of the end of June this year, TongRenTang had a total of 1,243 stores, with a net decrease of 36 stores due to the closure of 42 stores and the opening of 6 new stores in the first half of the year, indicating a contraction in the offline business footprint.
Founded in 1669 during the eighth year of the Kangxi reign in the Qing Dynasty, TongRenTang is a well-known brand in the traditional Chinese medicine industry. It focuses on pharmaceutical manufacturing and includes sectors such as commercial retail and health preservation. TongRenTang currently belongs to China Beijing Tongrentang (Group) Co., Ltd. In 2006, it was recognized by the Chinese Ministry of Commerce as one of the first “China Time-Honored Brands.”