By Raghavendra Kamath & Neeraj Thakur Business Standard Mumbai/new Delhi June 29, 2009, Vijay Pokare, owner of a 400 square foot store in Mumbai's Dadar market, knows his onions - literally. Just four months ago, he used to sell just 20 kg of them every day. After the nearby Subhiksha store on the ground floor of Shiv Sena Bhawan closed, Pokare spotted an opportunity and started packing washed onions in two kg plastic bags with a 10 per discount tag. Sales have soared three-fold since then. In South Delhi's Kalkaji area, a dozen small mom-and-pop stores (known as kirana stores…
CONTINUE READING
By Sangita Ghosh & Sarimul Islam Choudhury Indiretailing.com Thursday, June 25, 2009 By how much has the consumer's pocket been impacted by the economic crisis? This is a question that has been troubling consumer goods manufacturers and retailers over the past few months. Thoughts on how to emerge from the crisis slowdown stronger and more resilient are keeping most modern retailers busy these days. How the Indian retail industry navigates the current challenges will determine its character and shape in the coming years, experts say. It has been suggested that investing in innovation during a downturn helps retailers counter depressed…
CONTINUE READING
It has been around 200 years since the birth of Charles Darwin, and about 150 years since the publication of his and Alfred Wallace’s thoughts on evolution by natural selection. In their honour, let us remind ourselves of the basic theory that all of us learn at school. (So I'm a few months late acknowledging it - please bear with me!) On Evolution: Change Happens (1) Species differ from each other, but individuals within a species also differ from each other quite a bit. (2) These differences are due to changes to the basic genetic framework of the organism (mutations)…
CONTINUE READING
By Raghavendra Kamath Business Standard Mumbai June 16, 2009 Speciality homeware retail chains, such as Kishore Biyani's HomeTown, Landmark group's Max Retail and Wadhawan group's Home Store, have changed tack as home sales drop and shoppers defer buying big-ticket items like furniture and furnishing to save cash in the downturn. The realty sector has seen home sales fall by up to 70 per cent in the early part of this calendar year from the peak in 2007-08 and developers have shifted to smaller, affordable homes to counter the drop in sales. Consequently, retailers are witnessing a drop in sales, too.…
CONTINUE READING
By Sangita Ghosh and Sarimul Islam Choudhury Indiaretailing.com 12 June 2009 The sustainability of any business depends - to a large degree - on loyal customers who come back again and again for more shopping and organised retail is not an exception to that. This is a part of strategic management where the retailer has to think on the pointers of his business model; this includes service that leads to customer satisfaction, which leads to customer loyalty and which in turn leads to profitability. The factors related to retailer-customer relationship and the customer's satisfaction help retailers to have a better…
CONTINUE READING
