Who is keeping Pilulka's online pharmacy afloat?

A cleaner shop floor, a darker balance sheet

If you have ordered vitamins, nappies or a cold remedy online in the Czech Republic, there is a good chance the parcel came from Pilulka. The company runs an online pharmacy with pick-up points and branded stores, and it sells the kind of goods people buy without thinking twice. Its 2025 accounts tell a story people would not guess from the delivery van.

The figures are consolidated, so they cover the whole group, prepared under Czech accounting standards, in Czech koruna, for the calendar year. Pilulka Lékárny is an a.s., a joint-stock company. In 2025 it booked a net loss of CZK 120m, wider than the loss of CZK 88.1m a year earlier. At the end of the year its equity stood at CZK -134m, down from CZK -94.0m. Negative equity means the company owes more than all its assets are worth. Against total assets of CZK 197m, that is an equity ratio of -67.9%.

That is the background to the line in the auditor's report that matters most. PricewaterhouseCoopers Audit gave an unqualified opinion, which means the statements present the company's position fairly. In the same report it drew attention to a material uncertainty related to going concern. In plain words: the numbers are right, but whether the business can keep paying its way over the coming year is an open question.

The shop got better, the company got poorer

Here is the turn. On the operating level, 2025 was Pilulka's better year. The operating loss narrowed to CZK 16.1m from CZK 67.7m. EBITDA, which is operating profit before depreciation and amortisation and a rough gauge of whether day-to-day trading pays for itself, swung from CZK -3.4m to CZK 18.2m. The EBITDA margin moved from -0.3% to 2.1% of revenue. For a pharmacy retailer, where margins on medicines and drugstore goods are thin to begin with, getting back above zero is a real step.

Part of that improvement deserves a closer look. Operating profit improved by CZK 51.6m, but EBITDA improved by only CZK 21.6m. The difference is depreciation and amortisation, which fell from CZK 64.3m to CZK 34.3m. Smaller write-offs on warehouses, software and shop fittings flatter the operating line without a single extra customer walking in. I would credit the business with the EBITDA gain and treat the rest as accounting relief.

The bigger story is what happens between operating loss and net loss. In 2025 the company lost CZK 16.1m running its business and CZK 120m in total. Interest of CZK 16.8m explains only a slice of that gap. The larger part came from other items below the operating line, and the accounts do not break that remainder down in the headline figures. Whatever it was, it pushed the net margin to -13.7%, from -8.1% a year earlier.

A business that has been shrinking for three years

The losses would be easier to carry if the company were growing into its costs. It is not. Revenue fell for the third year in a row: from CZK 1.8bn in 2022 to CZK 1.6bn in 2023, CZK 1.1bn in 2024 and CZK 877m in 2025. The last step alone was a drop of 19.8%, or CZK 216m of sales.

In online retail, that pattern usually has one of three causes. Customers drift to rivals that undercut on price or delivery. The market itself cools after a boom. Or the company deliberately cuts unprofitable lines to stop selling goods at a loss. The third would fit a year in which revenue fell and EBITDA turned positive at the same time. The accounts do not split revenue by product or channel, so they cannot settle which cause dominates here. A breakdown of sales by category would show it.

For a company with negative equity, this is the uncomfortable part. A smaller business has less margin in absolute koruna to pay off obligations that do not shrink with sales: the interest, the leases, the debts to suppliers.

Why auditors raise the flag

Auditors raise a going concern uncertainty when the numbers leave it unclear whether a company can meet its obligations over the next year. The usual ingredients are recurring losses, negative equity, loans falling due and dependence on owners or lenders to keep funding the business. Pilulka's accounts show the first two plainly: a net loss two years running and equity that fell by CZK 39.9m in a single year.

Cash did rise, to CZK 15.6m from CZK 10.2m. That cushion is small next to a company with CZK 877m in annual sales and an interest bill of CZK 16.8m. When a business keeps paying its bills in a state like this, someone outside the income statement is usually carrying it: owners, a lender or suppliers who wait longer for their money. The accounts do not show which of them will carry the coming year.

Management has set out its plan in the annual report. It wants a gradual return to operating profitability and positive EBITDA, deeper use of its Pilulka PRO personalised prevention programme and more AI agent features on the platform. More to the point for the auditor, it promises strict liquidity management and faster inventory turnover. In an online pharmacy, stock is where cash goes to sleep, so selling through what is on the shelves faster is the quickest money the company can find.

What it means for customers and suppliers

For shoppers, nothing changes overnight. A going concern note is not insolvency, and orders still ship. The flag matters more to suppliers and landlords. A supplier extending credit to a company with negative equity is, in effect, lending to it, and many will shorten payment terms or ask for guarantees. That pressure lands directly on the liquidity management promised in the outlook.

For the Czech online pharmacy market, the accounts are a reminder that convenience is expensive to deliver. Warehouses, delivery and price competition with brick-and-mortar chains cost money whether the basket is large or small, and a falling basket exposes that quickly.

For anyone running a business, the check is simple. List every loan, lease and supplier payment falling due over the coming year, set it against your cash and the cash your operations actually generate, and see how many months the gap gives you. If the answer makes you nervous, talk to your lenders before your auditor has to write the question down.

Pilulka has proved it can run its shops closer to break-even. Its balance sheet has not yet heard the news, and until the net line stops eating the equity, the auditor's question mark is the most accurate figure in the report.