The Mexican pharmacy chain Farmacias Similares and fintech firm Stori have launched a new co-branded credit card, which is expected to help millions of Mexicans who are not enrolled in the formal financial system access credit. 

The card is adorned with the Farmacias Similares mascot, Dr. Simi, a mustachioed character wearing a white lab coat, who has become a Mexican cultural icon. 

The Farmacias Similares x Stori card is the company’s latest effort to connect its credit products with a retailer following the 2024 launch of Stori SHEIN, expanding the ultra-fast-fashion brand’s reach in the Mexican market. It also aims to provide credit for people who cannot easily access traditional financial institutions.  

Around 51% of Mexico’s population is unbanked, according to the 2023 World Bank Financial Inclusion National Survey. This is largely because Mexico continues to have a large informal workforce, at almost 55% of workers, who contribute around 25.4% of GDP, according to Mexico’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI). 

“We want to tear down the barriers that separate Mexicans from credit and demonstrate that money can also be on the ‌side ⁠of the most important thing we have, which is health,” said Stori’s co-founder and chief governance officer, Marlene Garayzar.

The card offers users a 25% discount on their first purchase and a monthly discount of up to 10% on purchases at Farmacias Similares’s physical and online stores, so long as the card was used as payment elsewhere during the previous month.

Farmacias Similares is popular for offering a wide range of low-cost generic medicines and is now one of Mexico’s most well-known retail brands, operating over 11,000 stores across the country and launching in Texas in 2025. 

Stori was founded in Mexico in 2018 and has expanded rapidly by offering credit products ⁠to people with limited or no formal credit history, with a customer base of around 5 million. 

With reports from Reuters, El Economista and PCMI