OREANDA-NEWS. February 10, 2011.  Sumitomo Corporation subsidiary Soukai Drug Co., Ltd., which sells daily necessities and health foods on the Internet, has again won the grand prize in the "Rakuten Ichiba Shop of the Year 2010" awards. Based on popularity polls and sales, the prize is awarded to the year's best performer from among approximately 34,000 online shops registered with Rakuten Ichiba, the largest online shopping mall in Japan. Soukai Drug also scooped the prize in 2009 and is the first company to win the prize for two consecutive years.

"We managed to garner greater support from customers after winning the prize last year," said Dai Yoshizawa, Web group leader at Soukai Drug. "As shopping on the Internet has now become an ordinary mode of shopping, Internet sales have been recognized as a viable sales channel by manufacturers. We have also been able to earn their confidence and that gives us further opportunities to run campaigns in collaboration with manufacturers."
The company has increasingly cooperated with beverage and food product manufacturers to run Web-based campaigns.

In summer 2010, the company completely revamped its Website to enhance customer convenience. It also introduced a membership system in which customers are classified into gold, silver and regular categories, according to their shopping history. The new Website also offers a record function and other new functions to enhance retrieval performance. In addition, the company has consolidated its operational capabilities by expanding its logistics warehouse to deliver products to customers faster. Feedback from customers is shared among all employees with the aim of achieving the best quality service."Customers expect more and more from us," said Mr Yoshizawa. "We would like to offer products and services that exactly meet their wants and needs." Soukai Drug is committed to upgrading and expanding its product lines to not only boost the satisfaction of existing customers but also develop new ones.