RETAIL MANAGEMENT A STUDY ON RETAIL LOCATION SELECTION ANALYSIS

What is retail management? Retailing is defined as a conclusive set of activities or steps used to sell a product or a service to consumers for their personal or family use. managing the retail side of a business such as points of sale, stock control, and just-in- time purchasing

About retail site selection analysis Retail site selection analysis can be extremely helpful to grow business to keep away from incurring losses. It also helps to simplify tasks, allowing to interact with different business – associated activities. The concept target potential consumers.

OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY: To formulate the location strategy and site selection for new retail outlet. To know the factors involved in selecting a retail location. To identify the locational factors that influence the location of retail stores

NEED FOR THE STUDY: To define the type of business in the broadest terms and determine your long-term objectives. To learn about the demographics of the population, about the kind of competition they'll be facing, and about traffic patterns in the area. To check several more aspects of the location to help insure the satisfaction with -- and most importantly the success at - the site chosen.

SCOPE OF THE STUDY: The study will help in understanding the Location strategy and site selection for new retail outlet To know about the main factors which affect or influence the location of retail outlet. Study will reveal which are important factors in customer’ point of view so that by adding new service elements along with providing better quality in delivering current service, difference may be created.

FACTORS ANALYSED: A retailer has to consider the following factors while selecting a site:  Kind of products sold  Cost factor  Competitor’s location  Ease of traffic flow and accessibility  Parking and major thoroughfares  Market trends  Visibility

FINDINGS: Following are the approximate results of the study made on location selection analysis.  People belonging to the age group of years make more purchases, say 33%  Parking facilities are expected by 70% which is considered as an important issue.  Another important issue sorted out in this study is traffic. 80% of the respondents felt this as a major issue.  Customer loyalty is the biggest challenge again here. Nearly 63% people stay loyal to their stores.  Number retail shops: For the population of 46% there exist 2 – 4 shops. For 33.3%, more than 4 shops

SUGGESTIONS: Parking facilities should be taken care of. All these should be planned before the commencement of store. Customer loyalty is the major issue. In the scenario of the growing competition, making the customers to stay loyal is challenging task. So the stores management should keep improving their customer satisfaction methodologies.

CONCLUSION: From this study it is clear that simple approach to successful store location consists the following:  know who the specific retail customer is,  know where they live and  locate in a position to capture their sales.

Site selection technology is about  creating targeted marketing,  managing consolidation,  valuing customers and  even determining merchandise mix