Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to Grupo Palval's video conference to discuss business results relative to Q1 2025. This conference is being recorded, and the replay facility will be made available at the company's IR website. The respective slide deck can also be downloaded at the same website. All participants will be connected in listen or watch-only mode during the company's remarks. After that, we'll start a Q&A session when further instructions will be provided. We also offer a feature for translation both into English and also into Brazilian Sign Language. To turn it on, just click on the interpretation button in the bottom part of the Zoom screen. Before moving on, I'd like to reinforce that forward-looking statements are based on beliefs and assumptions on the part of Grupo Palval's management and also on information currently available.
Such forward-looking statements might involve risks and uncertainties as they refer to future events which depend on circumstances that may or may not materialize. Investors, analysts, and journalists should bear in mind that events related to the macroeconomic environment, to the industry, and to other factors might lead the results year-end to emerge considerably different from those expressed in forward-looking statements. Joining us today for the conference, we have Mr. Julio Netto, CEO, and Mr. Antonio Knapp, CFO and IRO. I'd like now to turn the floor over to Mr. Julio Netto for his opening remarks. Please, sir, you may carry on.
Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Good morning. We are here in Porto Alegre now. It's a beautiful day, a beautiful autumn day, fall day, very dry, very different from last year where we had lots of rains, a huge crisis in early May because of the floods. Today we have a, how can I put it, a more interesting year. Today is a sunny day, as I said. Very nice, very good to be here with you as we present our Q1 results for 2025. The numbers show a very high level of resilience on the part of the company in terms of innovate, in terms of growing, even amidst so many challenges that have been put in our way since last year, and also the challenges in the macroeconomic space. We see several peers, several competitors suffering through the moment, and we understand we are able to produce very interesting numbers in that respect within a calendar which was not favorable, where we had one less day in 2025 when compared to 2024, which was a leap year.
We grew 15.9% in sales with a highlight, which is quite important, the retail, which is the growth of mature stores to the tune of 9.8% is what really helps us dilute costs throughout time. It is the first quarter, as you know. I think it is the first quarter we show a number for retail at that level. A very important transformation from last year. After the flood and all that, we decided to interrupt our wholesale operations. From here on end, we only have retail. We have the industry number as well. We are an important manufacturer of cosmetics and other products for our own brand and for third parties. That is a differential which is important, but the numbers are still small. They do not justify being presented here during the call. We maintained our margin. That is an important highlight.
Our margin has grown very much in line with sales, gross retail gross margin, 29.4%, and that led us to an EBITDA of BRL 64 million in Q1, which is also a good result. We had an increase in share, quite important across all regions where we operate. We can break those numbers down further on by state. I have an important highlight to share in terms of states, especially in Santa Catarina State. Matt will address that in a moment. Palval Products, our private label, is once again an important protagonist in this scenario amidst a challenging environment. Companies that have tangible edges will play a more of a leading role. Our private label products, our Palval Products, are starting to play an important role once again.
In the digital front, we still see good growth, and the whole industry, I think, should wonder, ask themselves, what share of digital would be healthy for the company? Also, an important highlight in terms of free cash flow. Once again, last year, we had a period where we had, because of the floods, we lost control on our inventory. We bought from several suppliers. We were able to reduce inventory in this first quarter, and we had some impact in lead times from suppliers, which is directly linked to fewer businesses being closed. We understand this will come to a normal level in the coming quarters as we resume to our business level of previous times. Those are the main highlights for 2025 Q1. The company has never had ups and downs very, very marked, especially downs.
We had a lot of ups, but not so many downs. Our CAGR is quite interesting. We have been growing consistently since 2011, a CAGR of 14.5%. In this quarter, it shows we have been able to maintain our new Palval, as you call it, for the past five years, growing fast and consistently. That CAGR went up to 17%, as you see on the right-hand side of the slide. That is where we intend to stay. Now I turn it over to Matt for him to continue, and I'll be back down the presentation.
Thank you, Julio. Once again, thank you for being with us this morning. Let's start to give you some more color on the numbers of our financial statements. This quarter was quite good. We're quite happy with what we're delivering now. As Julio said, strong growth in sales, 15.9%, on top of a base which was strong already coming from last year, where we had grown 16.4% last year. It is worth mentioning the following. Number one, our ability to increase our average sale per store. We closed Q1 2025 with an average sale per store of BRL 705,000, a growth of something close to 10% vis-à-vis last year. That is quite important. That speaks directly to productivity. You can see on the chart on the bottom, the quality of our stores has improved significantly. 36% of our stores are already selling over BRL 700,000, significant growth vis-à-vis last year. That number, a growth of 24%. When you look at the bottom part of that pyramid, an inverted pyramid, we see we are increasingly reducing the number of stores that sell up to BRL 300,000.
Only 5% of our store base have revenues at that level. We are talking about new stores as well. Stores that have just opened, and that means our mature stores that grow over 700,000 are very healthy. Another important piece of data is when you look at the competition. When you look at the right-hand side of the slide, this comes from IQVIA. The source, they show that Palval continues to have the highest average sale in the southern region, and it is expanding this gap from 2023 to 2025 every year. When compared to the competition, we are having the ability to expand that gap in terms of average sales. That shows in our results, our bottom line, of course. That increase in average sale talks with two elements. Number one, the one which is highlighted here, the growth in same-store sales and mature sales.
Our mature stores have grown almost 10% in sales in the first quarter, way above inflation, and that has helped us dilute all store-related costs. We are doing our homework in terms of existing stores. When we look at our expansion, we also get the same conclusion. Down the road here, during the presentation, we will give you some more detail in terms of expansion, but just a glimpse. We are keeping our growth pace. We have opened 52 stores in the last 12 months, nine stores in the first quarter, and we closed this period until March with 639 stores. It is worth remembering that since our follow-on until now, since 2020 up until now, 285 new stores were added to our base. That is why we still have almost 30% of stores still maturing, and we already see the results.
That means we have good seeds that we have sown, and going forward, as those stores mature, those results will increase even further. A quick important mention to the state of Santa Catarina. In the second quarter, we have reached 100 stores in Santa Catarina State. A state that, as you will see, has welcomed us really well. We are very happy to be there, and we would like to thank the people of Santa Catarina for the good results we have achieved in that state. That all combined results in good market share. We are in the 20th consecutive quarter of market share gain, 20 quarters across all states in the southern region, with a special highlight, as I mentioned, to Santa Catarina State, where we have gained almost 1% in market share quarter-on-quarter.
Even in a mature state, which is Rio Grande do Sul, we still gain market share. In Paraná, we are also doing really well. São Paulo and the capital city of São Paulo, we have been working hard with good results. We have already surpassed 1% of share in the city of São Paulo, the largest economy in Latin America. It is worth mentioning, an important landmark. I would like to reinforce in this slide the following. Going beyond regional growth, it is important to mention that we are also growing our share across all product categories. We grow in medications, medicines. We grow within medications in brand, generics, and we also grow in cosmetics and beauty. Palval is able to balance our positioning in health, our positioning in cosmetics, which is clearly shown by the numbers.
Moving on to the digital arm of the company, this is an important topic as well. It's important to remember that Palval's digital did not emerge during the pandemic. It already existed before the pandemic, and we had a significant share of digital in our company, but the industry as a whole had close to zero in terms of digital presence. For the past years, we have been growing, have seen the competition grow their digital channels as well. We have been monitoring that. We are curious about this topic because we'd like to understand what would be a healthy level for a retail company to have a digital channel. As a retail company, we should never look to have 100%, of course.
We always look at digital as a way to help customers make the most of their time, to help offer them a good solution for their time management, conveniently offering products in their own time. We want to deliver at people's homes. That is different and is important. I was watching a Netflix program the other day, 10:00 P.M., and I said, a chocolate bar would be really handy. I logged into Palval and in 10 minutes, I had a chocolate bar in my home as I watched my Netflix movie. That kind of convenience shows the relevance of the digital front. That is what digital is all about for Palval.
Unlike other competitors that truly believe in, how can I put it, in conversion retail to digital, where digital becomes a payment base or payment means and have different policies for that. Not for us. We do not see that as a smart approach, which is not even sustainable when you have different commercial policies for both arms. At the end of the day, you may have an impact on gross margins, which will be quite significant. When you have 25-30% of sales, that becomes a problem and no longer is a solution. We will continue to invest. This year, we have today, we have 250 stores that deliver to people's homes. Half of our sales are delivery to people's homes and the other half click and pick up. We move on to 400 stores with delivery services. We understand that is the main role of drugstore chains, delivery.
We had a great result for the digital front, but I would like to also add that the digital share has a limit where it will remain healthy for the company. That all started in the pandemic, but it's time for us to stop and take stock to define the real role of digital initiatives for each company. Moving on, Julio did mention the digital, one of our edges. Another competitive edge is our services arm, the Palval Clinic services. They represent about 1% of sales, a small number, but that is a highlight because throughout time, we're able to link Palval's brand to quality, health, quality, well-being. With that, our clients, our customers, especially in the south of Brazil, they look for Palval when they want to do a test or get a shot, a vaccine. That shows in our leadership numbers.
We have a market share of vaccination in the south of Brazil of over 45% in terms of vaccination. Once again, our market share as Palval is 13%. We lead services across the board, including tests, exams of over 20% market share. We continue to invest. We truly believe in services. Invest in preventive health. That is important for the population, and it is important also from the point of view of bringing clients to the store. On average, those customers buy more. They have higher average ticket, and they are more frequent. We continue to invest. We have many new things coming for going forward. That is a growth avenue that we believe in the coming quarters will be way above 1%, which is today, which will bring not only more customers, but more revenue and more profits.
Our Palval Products is also a major highlight that we have in the quarter. We are once again growing, without a doubt. The business unit which had the higher impact last year, our lab was shut down, was totally underwater, and they manufactured 35% of our products, and it was literally underwater last year. We cannot compare what Palval does with what the others do out in the market in terms of our own products. Our benchmarks have to do with Boticário and Natura, those large big players. That is where we compare ourselves with. This year, we will have many new launches. Our aim is to elevate our share further. We have been talking about reaching 10% of sales. This quarter, we produced 7.8%, and we see HP as an important source. 18% of HP are for Palval Products, hygiene and beauty.
We see customer behaviors changing, and our companies tend to keep up or try to keep up with customers' changes to remain relevant. I do understand that some products are different for the company, not a generic brand, but something special for the company. It is key for retail or for retailers that intend to be relevant to have their own brands well positioned. Our products take a central role in our strategy, and this will continue to be the case as we move towards 10% of total sales. Margins are higher, which is also important, way above margin for HP. There is an important element, which is even more important than margin, making customers loyal to the brand.
I invite you all to go to TikTok and look for Palval and check out what we have been receiving in terms of organic responses from consumers, consumers who are loyal, who are obsessed by our Palval products. They post videos and then compare that with what you see in the competition, and you understand what I'm saying. Moving on. The Marshmallow line was quite successful on the right-hand side of the screen. Young consumers really loved it. Our idea was to have a limited supply of that, one shot only. That comes from China. We're not manufacturing that one specifically, but it was such a hit. We had so many orders from teenagers, from 13 to 16 years of age, for us to go back with them.
In September, we'll have a new Marshmallow line being launched to meet that demand from those younger customers, especially girls. They are our future customers as well, right, as they age, right. Okay, that's it, Julio. We depend on new customers. We have to meet demands across the board from our customer base. Very good. We move on in terms of sales on the final slide, a breakdown per category. That's a clear message. We grew significantly across all categories. We did really well in medications, really well in OTC, and really well in personal care and beauty. Personal care and beauty grew by 15% in the period, once again, on top of a base which was already strong coming from last year.
This balance is fundamental because it reinforces our position of working hard on medications without forgetting our competitive edges when it comes to beauty and personal care. That positions us differently in the market. Our self-service OTC and HP grew significantly as well. That means customers inside the store, effectively inside the store. That is a trend we see materializing going forward for the rest of the year, and we will come back to that in a moment. Lastly, we talk about NPS. NPS, we always bring NPS. There is no sales if you do not have good service. One thing fits into the other. NPS is something we measure at every store, at every sales channel, and it is also part of the variable compensation for all our managers. We preach and we do it.
We continue to be one of the main benchmarks in NPS for the pharma retail in Brazil. Growing sales, delivering well, we are also a benchmark for our app, in our website, and we are the largest winner in terms of awards. All of that across the board is part of our ecosystem, and we always remain accountable for the market and for our customer as well. Moving on from sales, let's start looking at other lines of our financial statement, gross margin, expenses, and bottom line. Gross margin, it was mentioned before. When we look at the gross margin for retail, without a doubt, one of the main achievements in the quarter, we have maintained our gross margin at the same level, 29.4% coming from last year. How did we do it? Even growing well, sales and medications, and growing across the digital channels.
This was levered by a lot of work on our pricing policies and discount policies, an increase in penetration of our own products and OTCs, as you just saw in the previous slide, and a great job done by our commercial department, negotiating well with suppliers. That sets us apart in this moment, in this quarter, and it shows that we do have the tools in hand to grow sales without losing margins. That is the first observation to be made, something we are looking at for the rest of the year as well.
When you look at the gross profit for the group, when you look at our numbers in detail later, gross profit for the group last year, and I'd like to remind you of that last year, in addition to having wholesale last year, in the first quarter of last year, we also sold an asset, a plot of land, which had a positive impact for gross margin. We have to eliminate, exclude all those non-recurring goings. If we remove the asset disposal, of course, now I have a larger gross margin as a group in Q1 because I no longer have wholesale operations. It is what we call a mixed effect coming from business. That effect is directly linked with expenses. All our selling expenses and also our GMA expenses, they all grew less than the sales in retail. They grew below 15%. Selling expenses grew 7.8%.
GMA expenses grew 13.6%. That difference does not appear in our numbers yet because we no longer have the wholesale. That is the mixed effect I just mentioned. If I exclude that effect, both selling expenses and GMA expenses, they dilute within the quarter. In other words, the margin, the gross margin effect offsets the expenses. The wholesale effect as of the second quarter will be increasingly less relevant, and then all bases will resume previous levels. All of that leads to a growth which is quite robust in terms of EBITDA. Our EBITDA for this quarter is BRL 64.46 million, growing over 7% and a margin expansion of 0.2 percentage points, on top of a strong basis coming from the first quarter. Let's look at last year's first quarter. We sold that plot of land, as I mentioned. It is worth mentioning the following as well.
Not only this snapshot of Q1 2025, but a trend that you see throughout time. If we look at the first quarters from 2022 on, bottom part of the screen are a bit. The numbers have been growing by approximately 18% year-on-year, way above the growth in sales for Palval, which has kept an average of 15%-16%. That is gain in productivity. Where is that gain becoming really clear across our stores? We always have our report, our retail EBITDA, which is what the market calls EBITDA for all, only for the stores. Some other people call it contribution margin. As you can see here, we are also growing strong in our retail EBITDA. We are increasing that margin even with 285 new stores since 2020.
That comes thanks to, on the one hand, all our success in our sales strategy and all the dilution of expenses that we have been able to obtain across the stores. This is the main component, and it has to be because we are a retail company to also be able to have good future results. Now, closing the numbers part, we get to the profit or income, the same trend we saw for EBITDA. See an expansion in margin in Q1. We grow 0.1 percentage points, income growth of 5% on top of a strong basis, once again, counting on that sale of that asset. If you look at the numbers in detail later, last year, we benefited after the asset disposal by a tax, a positive tax impact. Even with that, we grew our income really well. An important highlight for our financial expenses dilution.
That talks directly with one of the main accomplishments of the quarter, which is our cash generation cycle. We were very successful in our strategy of adapting our financial cycle. As Julio just mentioned, there's a lot to be done going forward, but we generated free cash flow, which was positive this quarter of over BRL 14 million, and we did it. Growing sales, growing results, growing income, and growing investments. In other words, we are in a very balanced point of value generation for the company. It is also worth mentioning here the following. Usually, Q1 of all years, the first quarter, and you can look at the numbers back, our track record, and also other companies which are listed. In Q1, we usually burn cash. We have inverted that trend thanks to a series of initiatives.
In addition to that, it's also worth mentioning that we have generated cash, we have improved our financial cycle, and we have reduced our debt cost, our total debt. Today, our debt costs less than CDI, CDI minus 1.1%. We have maintained the same leverage we had last year, 1.2 times net debt EBITDA ratio. Across listed companies, we are one of the lowest debt levels, one of the lowest net debt EBITDA ratio levels in the industry. That's a really important competitive edge. We see competitors that are struggling to invest because of high debt, and we are in a very balanced, comfortable position. That's why we continue to grow, continue to invest in a very healthy way. Now we move on to our strategic pillars. Moving towards the end of the presentation, we like to show and describe our pillars and talk about expansion and customers.
Here, we're going to address questions you may have about this. We like to share our outlook. Our outlook has not changed in terms of pharma retail, in terms of accomplishments and good results. We continue to operate in probably the best retail market in Brazil, the pharma retail. It continues to go above inflation. The region where we operate continues to grow and grows more than average in Brazil. Lots of opportunities to be tapped. It's a very fragmented area. Pharma networks account for 50% in the southern region, and you have an aging population as well. That's why I continue to address our expansion well.
We continue to focus on stores that meet the demands for higher income bracket public and also popular, ABC, as we call it, a large focus on the southern region, even though we have a very good performance in the city of São Paulo, as I mentioned. We are going to the countryside of the city as well. We now have a penetration in 150 cities, and that tends to expand as well. We have a very good footprint in large cities, but there is still a lot of room to grow, to increase, a lot of opportunities to grow in cities with 200,000 population inhabitants. When we look at all the work that has been done throughout the first quarter, the IQVIA data that you see now helps us see where our strengths lie.
We are glad to be able to share with you that we are doing our homework across all elements. For the first quarter, we grew above the market and above the competition in volume of sales. We also saw an increase in average prices, so our mix was well above approach. We were doing our homework in expansion, and even the stores that closed had a lower impact in sales than the average. All those impacts combined result in a very good performance across all states. Palval is quite consistent across our region, and that, of course, reflects in our numbers. We always share with you our ROIC, our returns on invested capital for every year, the EBITDA for every year, every cycle, every year. We are operating with good rates above our targets.
Of course, there's always opportunity, which is clear, but we have been improving the quality of our base. That is clear when we look at the right-hand side of the slide, where we see the for all EBITDA for each state. Those are the last 12 months until the first quarter of 2025. We are getting closer and closer to higher levels. Santa Catarina in Paraná is getting close to Rio Grande. Look at São Paulo. I usually talk about this, but I wasn't showing the numbers before. We brought the numbers today just to show you the EBITDA for all for a year ago, 2024, so that you can see that we are maturing our base year-on-year, quarter-on-quarter, and improving results store by store. That's what motivates us and what makes us very optimistic when you look at the coming quarters.
We talk about expansion, and you have to talk about loyalty. We open stores, we grow technology, logistics, and the idea is to provide increasingly better services. We have a fishbowl, as I say, of 25 million clients, the whole of the southern region, and we have to activate those clients. We want them to buy at Palval, so we activate them. That active base today holds 7 million clients, has grown 7% vis-à-vis last year. The second phase is to make them loyal, make them buy more and more. That base has always been growing by 6%, and they have several tools to do that, CRM tools. We digitalize. We understand digital is an important lever for that, always with an eye at the customer, especially those chronic clients, most valuable, without forgetting the other ones, of course. That is what sets us apart.
We focus, but we deliver to all our client base. Nobody's left behind. I think we are getting close to the end. I have a couple of slides to finish before I finish, just to have a final message, and then I can move on to the Q&A session to give you some color on what we see coming for the second half of the year, second quarter, and second half. This is to reinforce our vision since what we've been through or since we went through last year because of the floodings and all the crisis that came from that, something difficult to imagine if you were not there. As a company, we have made important decisions since then, and we changed our level of operation.
We had been growing at a fast pace, but we're able to speed that up even further, and that can be seen in Q3 and Q4 last year and in Q1 2025. That is how we look at the rest of the year. We understand that we have great levers to keep our ramp-up in sales and good gross margins. Expenses will come to a stable level. We'll continue to increase productivity. We'll have a mathematical effect, an accounting effect, which is the adjustment of our wholesale base. All of that combined will lead us to have a higher capacity to expand our EBITDA margin and our net income margin throughout the year. Julio, this is it. This is what we have, and I turn it over to the operator for the Q&A session. Okay, back to the operator then. Thank you.
We'll now start the Q&A session for investors and analysts. If you have a question, please press the button and raise your hand. If your question has been answered, you can remove yourself from the queue by clicking on "Lower Your Hand." Our first question comes from Mr. Vinicius Preto from Itaú BBA. You may carry on, sir.
Good morning, Julio Netto. Congratulations on the numbers. Thank you for taking my question. I'd like to ask about the CMED readjustment. This has been a relevant topic when you talk to investors. I'd like to understand from you how you've seen this transfer on from suppliers until now. Some of them could reduce the discount. That was the rumor. I'd like to understand where you stand and from your end if you have been passing those increases on to customers. Also for the second quarter, with the lower CMED, how could that impact Q2 results? What can you tell us about it as we enter Q2?
The increase of CMED, which came out below inflation, it is not a problem, actually. This industry has a discount level, which is quite high. If we look at the financial statements, it is something that can be absorbed, that gap between inflation, which was granted as an increase of prices. We saw no reduction in commercial terms from suppliers. They are also absorbing in their own way that increase, that lower increase that has been approved, lower than inflation, I mean. The outlook for margins, and as for April, to your question, in April, we had good margins. The challenge for April were, the challenges were too many holidays, right. Too many holidays in April. That was a challenge.
Historically, the higher number than average. May 1st is not April, but sort of also impacted April. In any event, for May, the month of May, where we see a change in scenario, you have a full month, 31 days, a lot of working days. We are quite happy with the sales. The first numbers, the first couple of weeks for May have been positive. We see the same pace or the pace we expected to see.
That is it. Just to add, that is the takeaway. April had this calendar effect, and May so far has been performing well, positively. We do good margin levers, Vinicius, because we are growing well, OTCs. We are benefiting from the seasonality for flu, cold, climatic conditions in the south, healthcare or personal care and beauty, Palval products also expanding. When we look at all those elements, for now, we see a good resilient gross margin when compared to last year.
Okay, thank you.
Our next question comes from Larissa Sumer from XP. You may carry on, ma'am.
Good morning, Julio Netto. Congratulations on your numbers. Thank you for taking my questions. I'd like to explore a bit sales mix. When compared to listed peers who have already announced their quarter results, we see that your growth was quite balanced, even in hygiene and beauty, cosmetics and beauty. You saw a drop in sales, but you still grew at a very healthy level. I'd like to understand what is your mix strategy going forward. Second quarter, Netto did mention something about, but looking at the whole year, we understand that prescription drugs you'll have an increase. If you could comment on that as well and what you expect, and when you have the Mounjaro being launched as well, this new medication. For personal care and beauty, you mentioned your own brand. Can we expect Palval Products to gain share in sales? Also, in terms of beauty products, how do you see the competition with the marketplace? I know that e-commerce is important for you. Have you seen or identified any type of issue in that category? Thank you.
I'll start then. Larissa, there's too many questions. Okay, too many questions, but okay, let's try to address them all. Yes, what sets us apart in Q1 is our more balanced work around our product mix. When we look at the competition, that's the conclusion we get to. As I mentioned before, that's what sets us apart. Personal care and beauty is a strong pillar of our strategy. Yes, what sets us apart is not personal care, it is beauty. Personal care, everybody has the same products. As for beauty, for beauty, we do have a different experience to offer that explains part of that good performance. We do not see any signs. We are in the now half of the second quarter. We see no signs of change. Our beauty products continue to grow, of course, respecting competition. You mentioned marketplace. We are paying close attention to marketplaces. They compete with us, of course. They compete in prices. Some of them compete in delivery times, but in practice, most of what we sell, we have the ability to deliver, which is quite well where we operate.
With the exception of products that customers are able to wait, most products under beauty and personal care, they demand a quick delivery. They are convenience purchases. That competitive edge that we have is an entry barrier for most marketplaces across most categories. We are paying close attention to that. Also under beauty, a lot of innovation happening. The internet is not the best environment for you to know what's new in that space. Also, marketplace for some categories has been helping. May sound crazy, but I think for vitamins, for example, which has been growing a lot in Brazil, and in Brazil, the vitamin market is still not tapped. It's a small market when you compare to other segments. The marketplace has expanded the addressable market. It also presents an important opportunity for us, for us to ride that wave and grow along.
Dermatological cosmetic products, some suppliers, not all, some suppliers have a wrong view, in my opinion. I think the dermatological products, the skin products need drugstores more than the other way around. We see some kamikaze initiatives from some suppliers bringing prices really, really down very aggressively. I understand at some point they will understand that this might affect their brand, hurt their brand. They will be smart enough eventually to backtrack on that kamikaze strategy, as I said. When a product from La Roche-Posay or Monsieur Corp, when they become cheap, popular products, they lose their attractiveness, their appeal, their narrative. They lose what sets them apart. I think the industry will understand that eventually. Marketplace can be helpful, can be hurtful, but Palval has managed, as I mentioned, we compete really well, or even better, actually.
Our delivery time is way better than what the marketplace offers. We saw an important, very important evolution from platforms in terms of agility, expedition of delivery, and people's homes. It is still overnight. Palval delivers in up to an hour, right. Quite different, quite different. Marketplaces will never get there. You also asked about our prescription drug performance. That is a performance which is contracted, as you said. We can count on it. Prescription, branded products, they have grown well in April, and it is growing really well in May. With and without Mounjaro, you mentioned Mounjaro. Mounjaro sales are really good. One of the launches for the year, which reinforces our optimism irrespective of market trends. We sell an array of products that if one does not really well, we have other options. Mounjaro is but one example.
Whenever we exclude Mounjaro from the picture, the remainder of the medications are going well. Branded generics also growing well. Generics going at the same pace as branded products, which shows that us as Palval are able to meet different clients with different wallet sizes, right. Those who can buy lower medications will come to us. Those who can buy higher-end products will come to us as well. We cater to all customer profiles.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Mr. Thales Granello from Safra. You may carry on, sir.
Good morning. A quick question about market share. You have been gaining market share. The competitive environment has been improving, especially after the flooding last year. I would like to understand if the environment has improved more than expected. Who are you taking market share from? From the main regional networks that compete with you or chains or from smaller players?
Okay. Thank you for your question. Thales, in terms of market share, we have been speeding up our pace. We have been winning for 20 quarters, as I said, but we noticed a higher speed of gain even before the floodings. Second half of 2023, we saw that across the states, we were gaining share faster. Of course, the floodings were in Rio Grande do Sul where the effects were important. Of course, well-structured chains tend to benefit. That is the case for us. Looking at a broader angle, we are growing both in terms of chains and in terms of independent drug stores. I do not have the exact numbers who are we taking share from, but overall, we are getting share across all states.
Palval has emphasized its competitive edges as regional players choose different strategies. We have regional players that choose to have drug stores that sell everything. With all due respect, we prefer to focus on health and beauty. I think that's the best way to go. There are regional players that have been paying closer attention to states outside of the southern region, and that might be an opportunity for us as well. There are regional players going through different moments, operationally speaking. With all due respect, because everybody has their own strategy, they're all good, but we do believe that those gains in share are coming with the choices we've made. I want to be relevant across these markets with these kinds of customers, especially around health and beauty. I do not want to get distracted with other items. We have well-operated, well-managed stores.
We have a project, an architectural project, which calls people's attention. We have prettier stores, if I may, compared to the average. Ours are nicer. We have quality products. So when you think about services, when you think about something more sophisticated, you tend to look for Palval. When you combine all that and look at the second quarter as is, we do not see in the mid-run or in the short run a disruption in that trend of us getting increasingly more market share.
Thank you.
Thank you, Thales.
The Q&A session is now over. I would like to turn the floor back over to Mr. Julio Netto for his final comments.
Thank you all for participating. I would like to thank our team, people who have been working hard to deliver excellent results. We have over 11,000 employees. We have to acknowledge their work. I'll see you next quarter. Have a good one. Thank you. Our IR team remains available for comments or questions you may still have. Thank you. Have a nice one.
Grupo Palval's video conference is now over. Thank you all for participating. Have a nice day.