Founded in the 55th year (1795AD) of Qianlong reign of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) in the Xianyukou Lane of the Qianmen Avenue by Sun Zhenlan, a taoist from Shandong Province, At that time, Beijing Changchuntang Drugstore took a management pattern of shop in front and mill behind, and made processed crude drugs and medical herb in pieces by itself.

At the mention of "Changchuntang Drugstore", old Beijingers will think of the "Biwensan" (a medicine to prevent plague) immediately. Biwensan produced by Changchuntang Drugstore has the efficacy of sweet, cold, dispelling plague and removing summer heat, getting a few to smear into the nasal cavity, and the cool and refreshing feeling can spread to the heart and brain. In 1930s, a jingle had ever come down among the Beijing people, that is "Don't worry about the hot summer. Go to Changchuntang for Biwensan quickly, and smear it into the nostril to smooth the heart. Ensure your health by removing summer heat and relieving fever. Even to these days, the buyers purchasing Biwensan in the Changchuntang Drugstore was yet in an endless stream in midsummer. Biwensan not only has the efficacy of removing summer heat and relieving fever, but also has the function of smelling fragrance, opening the orifice and promoting resuscitation; moreover it acts quickly.

Biwensan is packed in an Eight Diagrams-shaped small case. When you dip a few with the tip of a finger and knead into the nostril, take a deep breath, then you can sense one burst of cool and refresh smell through the nose at once, refreshing, feeling better and clean in the whole body. Biwensan can also be taken with water. Changchuntang Drugstore had a printing house for producing packaging paper, directions and advertisements, and a workshop for founding the Eight Diagrams tin medicine case. Thus a complete system of manufacture and management came into being, including purchasing, manufacturing, packaging and sales, which had boycotted Japanese commodities effectively and occupied the market. In 1930s, the annual yield was up to 2,500,000 cases. Not only its products were sold domestically, but also it opened the market in Southeast Asia countries such as Thailand, Indonesia and Burma. At that time, various bazaars, little groceries and tea stores in Beijing were commissioned to sell Biwensan of the Changchuntang Drugstore. The Changchuntang Drugstore had set up branches in Taiyuan of the Shanxi Province, Tianjin and so on, and had also set up eight stores near the Xianyukou outside the Qianmen, including bier store, paper store, oil and salt store, and general store, etc. At this period, the Changchuntang Drugstore had developed to its great prosperity with the efforts of several generations.

After liberation, the Changchuntang Drugstore was moved to No. 28 East Qianmen Avenue (current address) from the former address in Xianyukou.

In the 1990s, the Changchuntang Drugstore rebuilt and expanded its buildings. Now it has a new four-storey office building with three on the ground and one underground. The shop was reopened on June 18, 1996.