Dubihlela, Jobo.Oluwakemi, Adejayan Adeola.Musukutwa, Ebinezer Tendaishe.2026-05-262026-05-2620262026https://hdl.handle.net/10413/24401Master's Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban.This study investigates the relationship between strategic management decisions and financial performance in South Africa’s regulated retail pharmacy sector, using Clicks Group Limited as a longitudinal case study. As the country’s leading pharmacy-led retail chain, Clicks provides an empirically rich context for evaluating how strategic choices shape firm-level outcomes over time. The study focuses on three core strategic initiatives undertaken by the company between 2015 and 2024: expanding its pharmacy footprint, growing market share, and innovating private-label health and wellness products. The research is theoretically grounded in the Resource-Based View (RBV) and Porter’s (1980) Generic Strategies, enabling analysis of how internal capabilities and competitive positioning interact to influence performance. A quantitative methodological approach was adopted, using audited financial statements, market reports, and regulatory disclosures to construct a ten-year panel dataset. Descriptive trend analysis, correlation testing, and multiple linear regression were used to examine the relationships among strategic decisions and four key financial indicators: Return on Investment (ROI), Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT), average closing share price, and revenue. The findings show that pharmacy expansion was consistently and significantly associated with improvements in EBIT and revenue growth, while market share influenced ROI. Private-label share, while relevant to strategic positioning, did not demonstrate statistically significant effects in adjusted models. These results suggest that strategic growth through scale and market presence exerts a greater measurable influence on financial outcomes than product innovation alone, particularly under conditions of regulatory constraint and price controls. Based on these findings, the study recommends that retail-pharmacy firms operating in regulated environments prioritise strategies that expand pharmacy networks and strengthen market presence, as these initiatives demonstrate the most consistent and measurable impact on operating profitability and revenue growth. Product innovation through private-label development should be positioned as a complementary rather than primary growth strategy, supporting differentiation and customer retention while recognising its more limited direct effect on financial performance under price-controlled regulatory conditions.enStrategic decisions.share price.EBIT.ROI.Retail pharmacy sector.Thesis