What pharmacy and health and beauty chains look for in a shop

Pharmacy chains look for a ground-floor unit on a main road or corner in a mature housing area, close to clinics, with parking right outside and a regular layout for shelves and a dispensary. Health and beauty chains want much the same, with more walking traffic. Both usually ask for a long lease with renewal options and time to fit out. Chains named below are examples only; none is an MCE client and MCE does not represent them.

Our pharmacy trade page lists the hubs MCE puts on a pharmacy shortlist first, and the size guide on the same site says most of these trades fit one standard unit of about 1,400 to 1,800 sq ft.

Start by checking that your unit fits the list above, because a pharmacy will walk away from an inner-row shop without parking however low the rent. Then price it against the market. Middle-half asking rents for shops in hubs on our pharmacy shortlist:

Source: MCE analysis of recent portal adverts, Nov 2026: last 6 months, shop types only, bait and duplicate adverts removed, middle half of asking prices.

Owners do name the trades they want. One Cheras Jaya corner ground floor at RM 13,000 a month was advertised "prefer pharmacy, Family Mart, coffee franchise, mamak", with a minimum of 2 to 3 years. A clear target like that, plus the right agent, reaches pharmacy operators faster than a generic "shop for rent" banner.

We have no verified published site criteria from BIG Pharmacy, so we will not quote any. Check the brand's official website for a property or site submission contact, and send a one-page pack: location pin, size, frontage width, parking, nearest clinics, asking rent and availability date. If your unit already meets the pharmacy column above, it is worth submitting.

The same applies: no verified site criteria are published that we can cite. Use the official channel or a registered agent, and lead with what a community pharmacy values most: the housing around you, the clinics within walking distance and parking outside the door.

Watsons is a health and beauty chain, so it reads a site more like a retailer than a dispensary. Show walking traffic, a wide display frontage and the shoppers who pass the row. Health and beauty chains trade in malls as well as on the street; MCE handles only the street side, ground-floor shops and whole shoplots.

A corner is the unit pharmacy chains like best, because it gives two signage faces and visibility from two directions. See corner lot or intermediate for how much more a corner usually earns. Then:

1. Ask a registered agent who lets ground floors in your hub and already deals with chain expansion teams.
2. Prepare the corner's selling points: both frontages, parking on both sides, clinics and housing nearby.
3. Decide in advance how you will answer the usual chain requests: a 3+3 term, a rent cap and a fit-out period. Our post on chain lease terms explains each one.

MCE presents corner units to pharmacy and other chain operators looking in that hub. List the unit through our landlords page.

Brief one agent on the whole roll-out rather than ten agents on ten shops, so the sites do not compete with each other. A good brief covers your target households, minimum frontage, parking need, rent range per outlet, preferred lease term and opening timeline. MCE runs multi-outlet searches across KL and Selangor hubs and can prepare a site report on request; the tenant side of this question is covered in our pharmacy site selection guide.

Written by Tok Ginstee (REN 37505), CID Realtors Sdn Bhd (E (1) 1855). Updated November 2026.