According to Lianshang.com statistics, globally as of the end of February 2025, 7-Eleven had 85,816 stores, significantly more than FamilyMart (24,620) and Lawson (22,098). Its overall sales were about four times that of FamilyMart and more than four times that of Lawson. In terms of market scale, 7-Eleven's position remains unshakable.

However, beneath the calm surface, undercurrents are stirring. In the just-concluded fiscal year 2024, in stark contrast to the continuous profit growth of FamilyMart and Lawson, 7-Eleven's profits declined significantly. More critically, in the two key indicators of customer count and average spend per customer, 7-Eleven even saw negative growth in the first three quarters, with nearly zero growth for the full year.

As the industry leader, why has 7-Eleven fallen into a situation of being continuously chased by competitors? Does the fierce competition among the three giants signal that the convenience store industry is moving towards a new stage of development?

Facing Substantive Challenges from Lawson and FamilyMart

Let us further analyze the operating data of the three major convenience store chains over the past five years.

The following data are based on domestic store statistics of the three brands, excluding overseas markets, to avoid the impact of regional differences on data comparability. As of the end of February 2025, the number of stores in Japan for 7-Eleven, Lawson, and FamilyMart were 21,743, 14,694, and 16,251, respectively.

From the perspective of per-store operating efficiency, although 7-Eleven's daily sales per store (approximately RMB 35,300) still leads the market, its five-year growth rate is only 7.8%, far lower than Lawson's 17.9% and FamilyMart's 16.2%. More notably, Lawson and FamilyMart's daily sales per store both reached approximately RMB 29,200 in fiscal year 2024, narrowing the gap with 7-Eleven to about 20%, indicating that Lawson and FamilyMart continue to optimize store operating efficiency.

Consumer behavior indicators further confirm this trend. 7-Eleven's existing store daily sales growth rate plummeted from 3.0% in fiscal year 2023 to 0.2% in fiscal year 2024, customer traffic growth also fell from 1.6% to 0.2%, and average spend per customer growth dropped from 1.4% to 0.0%. This "three zeros" state indicates that 7-Eleven's growth momentum has hit a bottleneck.

In contrast, Lawson maintained a 3.2% growth rate in existing store daily sales and a 2.1% growth rate in average spend per customer, showing strong resilience; although FamilyMart's customer traffic growth fell from 3.2% to 0.4%, in the general environment of declining traffic, a 2.5% growth rate in average spend per customer is also a very good performance.

Changes in operating profit margins also reflect the shift in competitiveness among the three. Although 7-Eleven maintained a high profit margin of 25.8%, it broke the three-year consecutive growth trend, declining by 1.4% year-on-year; Lawson and FamilyMart increased to 15.9% and 16.9%, respectively, up 8.5 and 1.9 percentage points compared to five years ago. If this divergence trend continues, 7-Eleven's profitability advantage may be gradually eroded.

Overall, although 7-Eleven's leadership position remains stable, from forward-looking indicators such as growth momentum, profitability, and consumer appeal, it is facing substantive challenges from Lawson and FamilyMart.

7-Eleven's "Major Strategic Mistake"?

In the past few years, Japan has experienced sustained inflation, leading to a decline in real wages, forcing consumers to adopt "defensive" consumption strategies. As staple products such as bento boxes and rice balls have successively increased in price, more and more ordinary consumers have reduced convenience store shopping and turned to more affordable drugstores and discount food supermarkets.

While rumors of "hidden price increases" in convenience stores were rampant, FamilyMart and Lawson took the lead. They faced the doubts head-on and launched multiple "more for the same price" campaigns, mainly covering high-frequency repurchase items such as hot snacks, rice balls, desserts, and sandwiches. At the same time, they focused on developing "high-value" products, maintaining reasonable price levels, and deepening customers' perception of their "product strength."

Lawson's "more for the same price" promotional product display

In contrast, 7-Eleven's operations team fell into a strategic hesitation, only belatedly launching the "Joyful Price!" promotion in the fall of 2024, far behind competitors in market response speed, and the effect was far below expectations. For price-sensitive consumers, these products presented an awkward positioning of "cheap but not delicious enough"; for middle- and high-income customers, the product experience clearly declined, leading to a dilemma of double loss.

Lianshang.com statistics found that although 7-Eleven's two core categories, "fast food" and "daily prepared food," contributed about 40% of merchandise sales, their growth rate lagged behind the market level, and even saw negative growth. In contrast, Lawson and FamilyMart maintained steady growth. This phenomenon deeply reflects 7-Eleven's strategic mistake in product strategy, with a "generation gap" between its market positioning and consumer expectations.

Another key issue lies in 7-Eleven's lack of a "consumer perspective." Its "Eco Price" and "Joyful Price!" campaigns launched in 2024 were originally intended to "not raise prices" or "offer collaborative products to make customers happy," but they actually damaged brand reputation. The former gave a condescending feeling of imposing environmental responsibility on consumers, while the latter attracted criticism due to the gap between product strength and the promise in the name.

In contrast, FamilyMart used "tearful eye pattern" discount stickers for near-expiry products, which not only avoided preaching but also triggered emotional resonance with customers, embodying the concept of "equal dialogue," successfully increasing the purchase rate of discounted products by at least 5%. When Lawson implemented incremental activities, its slogan was "Let's see how much we can pack!" which was both friendly and curious. This difference is not just a matter of marketing skill, but also the difference in the attitude of interaction between operators and consumers.

FamilyMart replaced discount labels for near-expiry products with tearful eye labels

As the "king of single format," 7-Eleven has to some extent failed to fully adapt to profound market changes. In today's increasingly diversified consumer demands, its successful model emphasizing standardization is facing severe challenges. As Japanese economic commentator Takahiro Suzuki pointed out, 7-Eleven faces a "major mistake," not just an ordinary strategic misalignment.

Structural Changes in Japan's Convenience Store Industry

In recent years, Japan's convenience store industry has undergone a quiet but profound structural change. The main customer base is shifting from "serving everyone" to "mainly serving the middle class and above." In addition, the chain convenience store market is basically saturated, and relying on increasing single-store formats is no longer sustainable.

Japanese distribution industry analyst Akito Nakai also believes that a wiser strategy is to develop "differentiated" formats, providing different product mixes and price strategies for different customer groups. In other words, it is necessary to develop the most suitable formats according to different "time constraint modes," such as business districts, residential areas, hospitals, construction sites, and roadside areas.

FamilyMart's unmanned trailer store at the Osaka Expo construction site

According to the latest statistics from Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, online physical goods sales in Japan increased by 5% year-on-year in 2023. Among them, food, beverages, and alcohol grew by 7%, and clothing and miscellaneous goods grew by 5%. With the proliferation of online businesses of major e-commerce giants and specialty stores, the advantage of convenience stores being "close and convenient" is weakening. In this situation, private brands have further become an important lever for convenience stores.

In addition, although convenience stores have been successful in POS system item-level management, contributing greatly to detailed tracking of product trends, their main focus is on products, and "who the customers are" is basically difficult to see. With the prevalence of points and applications today, digital transformation has become an unavoidable topic. Whether they can fully utilize big data to analyze consumer product combinations and price sensitivity, and further optimize customer segmentation and other marketing and format development, has become one of the major issues.

Japan's Convenience Store Industry "Ushers in a New Spring"

According to the Japan Franchise Association, the number of convenience stores in the country has stagnated since reaching 55,950 in 2021, falling to 55,736 by the end of 2024. According to official disclosures, 7-Eleven, FamilyMart, and Lawson plan to add a net of about 400 stores in fiscal year 2025, the highest in seven years. In an environment of intensified competition with drugstores and e-commerce platforms, this round of expansion plans is particularly noteworthy.

Companies are restarting growth strategies against the backdrop of market recovery, but face the practical challenge that traditional prime locations in urban areas and along roadsides are already saturated. 7-Eleven plans a net increase of 223 stores, mainly in urban redevelopment areas and key transportation routes; FamilyMart expects a net increase of about 100 stores, establishing a strategic partnership with Japan Post; Lawson maintains growth for the third consecutive year, focusing on filling the gap in rural markets left by supermarket withdrawals.

To address space constraints, the three major convenience store chains have innovatively shifted to smaller, specialized store formats, establishing "mini stores" in special locations such as factories and corporate parks. These stores not only occupy only a quarter of the area of traditional stores and have lower setup costs, but also can precisely meet the needs of specific customer groups, reducing operational uncertainty.

Facing the industry-wide problem of talent shortages, convenience stores are accelerating digital transformation. FamilyMart has opened 46 unmanned checkout stores operating with smart cameras and sensors; 7-Eleven introduced remote service robots at the Expo; Lawson is testing an intelligent ordering and delivery system. At the same time, 7-Eleven launched a store owner referral reward of up to 2 million yen (approximately RMB 102,000) to alleviate the difficulty of recruiting franchise owners.

Although this round of expansion is smaller compared to the scale of adding a thousand stores per year a decade ago, it marks a shift in the industry from pursuing network coverage to improving per-store operating efficiency and differentiated competition, reflecting the new path that Japan's convenience store industry is seeking for sustainable development in a mature market.