Environment is something that stands for an atmosphere which is external to the retail organisation. Retail store is a subsystem of a supra-system namely, environment because retail units cannot exist in vacuum. In selecting and developing a retail store environment, the retailer must consider its physical and psychological impacts on customer attraction, employee moral and store’s operations. Store’s operations and consumer shopping are both enhanced by a well planned and creatively designed setting. It is a mad, mad-world where ad, ad plays very important role. To appeal to the fashion conscious, hedonistic and up-scaled shopper, the store must create a theatrical environment enhanced by colorful displays and high-tech lighting and audio presentations. A retail store’s physical environment is a complex of the tangible elements of form reflected in the way land, building, equipment and fixtures are assembled for the convenience and comfort of both customers and the retailer. Equally significant Continue reading
Retail Management Concepts
Trends in Retail Formats
Retail industry is continuously going through changes on account of liberalization, globalization and consumer preferences. While multinational retail chains are looking for new markets, manufacturers are identifying, redefining, or evolving new retail formats. The existing retail houses are also gearing up to face the emerging competition from the organized sector and the changing outlook of the consumers. For example, consumer spending is shifting from goods to services. Accordingly the retailers too are fast adjusting to the changing consumer preferences. Consumers are not only looking for the core products or functional benefits from the retailers but also the non-functional benefits, which need to be compatible with their lifestyles. For example, most of the traditional eating joints in India such as Haldiram, Bikaner and Sagar Ratna have revised their product offerings and atmospherics on the lines of the multinational chains to compete with them and to serve changed expectations of the consumers. Continue reading
Golden Rules for Building Retail Displays
It goes without saying that the displays play very significant role in retailing and retail outlet. An attractive and informative displays can help in large volume of sales in terms of goods and services. In building a retail display, some fundamental rules should be followed to get best out of these where good deal of treasure, talent and time is involved on the part of retailer. This golden rules are: 1. Achieve Balance It is important to make sure that the display appears balanced to the viewer, in building display. This is achieved by arranging products and props in a particular way. A display may have formal or informal balance. “Formal” balance is achieved by balancing on each side of the center one more or more similar items. “Informal” balance is achieved by balancing on opposite sides of the center dissimilar items. The effects produced by informal balance are less Continue reading
Retail Investment in India – Retail as an Investment Option
Despite the huge presence of the unorganized sector, the Indian retail industry is attractive for international players (Read: Unorganized Retail in India). It is favored over China’s among the developing countries due to a slew of laws in the communist country at various levels. Though the market hasn’t seen big time players of the developed nations yet, the fact that Indian per capita retail space is among the lowest, is expected to provoke people to look at retail as a potential business arena. The growth of integrated shopping malls, retail chains and multi-brand outlets is evidence of consumer behavior being favorable to the growing organized segment of the business. Space, ambience and convenience are beginning to play an important role in drawing customers. With the Indian per capita income on the rise and the distribution of consumption expenditure expected to remain fairly stable, the current segments of food and apparel Continue reading
Trading Area Potential in Retail Site Evaluation
Most of the retail site evaluation procedures use the concepts of “trading area adequacy” and the “trading area potential” to predict the total trading area business and the share of business a particular retailer can expect. Read More: Trading Area Adequacy Trading area potential, it is something, which is predicted ability of a trading area to provide acceptable support levels for a retailer in future. The two important concepts in trading area potential are residential support levels and non-residential support levels. Residential Support Levels A retailer is to concentrate on the most important source of business, namely the area’s residents, after sufficiently identifying the gross trading area. To measure a trading area’s potential consumers, the retailer is expected to analyse population or demographic and household or residential variables. Population or Demographic Analysis. A trading areas total capacity to consume is partly a function of the total number of population and Continue reading
Concepts of Merchandising and Merchandise Planning in Retail
Retail Merchandising Merchandising is a process involving developing, securing and managing the merchandise mix to meet the firm’s marketing objectives. The merchandise mix stands for the retailer’s total offering, be it goods or services or both. The merchandising process is a three tier structural set of activities. The following configuration gives the idea of merchandising process. The first stage or tier is to do with developing the merchandise-mix which is composed of two elements namely product and service-mix. The second stage or tier is securing the merchandise-mix which involves two highly skillful and specialized activities namely the buying process and the procurement process. Here, the retailer determines “from where”, “when” and “how” to get products into the stores. The third and the final stage or tier in the merchandising process is managing the merchandising-mix which is to do with planning and controlling the merchandise to ensure efficient, profitable operations. Retail Continue reading