Retail TNT

Filthy Restrooms
Truly deserves the top spot in this list. Nobody wants to use a restroom that reeks of piss and a sink or toilet that looks like it hasnt been cleaned for over a year. Retail stores should always be sparkling clean, whether they are open for public use or not. Stock up on the bathroom essentials like tissue rolls, soap, trash receptacles and clean it daily.

2. Untidy Dressing Rooms
Always keep the dressing rooms free of discarded hangers, tags and empty packaging. Not only will it look pleasant for your customers, it will also save you from dishonest customers. Take a quick look for out of place items after each customer uses the dressing room.

3. Loud Music
Playing music in a retail store can help create a certain atmosphere for our shoppers. Music that is too loud, inappropriate or of poor quality can disturb your customers from their shopping experience.

4. Handwritten Signs
In this era of technology, there is no excuse for displaying handwritten signage. Printing signs from computers or using pre-printed signs are not much of a difficult task. Printed signs simply look more professional and signs with hard-to-read handwriting can be a customer turn-off.

5. Stained Floor or Ceiling Tiles
It is true, accidents happen. However, your customers don’t have to see them. Dirty carpet, stained flooring and ugly ceiling tiles can turn off many shoppers. Sweeping, vacuuming and mopping should be done on a regular basis. Consider hiring a professional cleaning crew to polish tile floors. Replace stained portions of carpet and ceiling tiles where possible.

6. Burned-out or Poor Lighting
Replace any burned out light bulbs as soon as possible. Make sure all customer areas of the store have ample lighting and take into consideration shoppers with aging or less than perfect eyesight. Your store should be well illuminated for all customers.

7. Offensive Odors
Certain odors are understandable and may even appeal to the customer’s sense of smell. However, shoppers don’t want to smell an employee’s lunch drifting across the store. Use neutralizers to combat any offensive odors.

8. Crowded Aisles
Consumers like a selection but not if it means sacrificing comfort while shopping. Be sure your store is designed to allow adequate space between aisles and keep walkways free of merchandise. Cramped spaces can ruin a shopping experience and turn off a customer.

9. Cluttered Checkout Counters
A stack of hangers, returned merchandise and sloppy work areas behind the checkout is a huge customer turn-off. This particular area where a customer’s financial transaction is taking place should not show any signs of disorganization. Like messy dressing rooms, a disorganized checkout counter can lead to theft. Keep those register areas neat and tidy.

10. Scarcity of Shopping Carts/Baskets
Your type of retail shop may not require a shopping cart or your store may be too small, but there’s not a single type of retailer that wouldn’t need at least some sort of shopping basket. If you hope for your customer to purchase more than one item in your store, be sure to have an adequate supply of shopping carts or baskets on hand.

How often do you go to the grocery store to find that your favourite product is sold out or is out of stock? How does this impact your customer experience and your perception of the retailer and the brand? If you are in the consumer packaged goods or retail business and this has happened to you then you now know how frustrating this type of occurrence can be from a customer’s perspective.

Good retail merchandising is the key to a brand’s success as it relates to brand perception, sales and customer retention. When a customer visits a retailer and items that they are looking for are not there simply because they have not made it to the shelf or, worse, are out of stock, it hurts the perception of both the brand and retailer.

Think about it. If you love Tide detergent and on your weekly grocery runs to Loblaw’s you cannot buy it two weeks in a row, what would you do?

1.You may switch grocery stores and start shopping at Metro because Tide is always in stock there. In this scenario the retailer is impacted.

2.You may switch brands of detergent, deciding to buy Sunlight instead. In this scenario the brand is impacted.

3.You may become frustrated, decide to switch grocery stores and go to No Frills, for example, to find that there is a huge cost savings by switching to the store’s “No Name” brand detergent. In this scenario both the brand and retailer are impacted.

In all three scenarios, had the brand been in stock and on the shelf, the customer would not have been inconvenienced and the brand would have retained its customer. We gave Tide as an example, which is a well-known item with massive brand recognition in the marketplace as well as a dedicated customer following. This brand may be considered “worth” switching retailers for. Many other brands may not yet have gained such consumer loyalty, which is why the stakes are high in retail merchandising.

Outside of offering a fantastic product, accessibility and reliability is a huge factor where customer retention is concerned. Products that are not properly merchandised (price tags are not on merchandise, for example) and not adequately stocked, result in lost sales for the brand and retailer and, in the worst case scenario, can result in a shift in customer loyalty.

Retail is extremely competitive and if you are a customer whose retailer is not carrying what you need you can be rest assured that another retailer (competition) within close proximity will. Something as simple as working with a company who offers retail merchandising services will ensure that the perception of your brand is not impacted by issues that occur at the retail level. Retail merchandising is something that requires constant attention to ensure that at any given time your product is in stock, on the shelf and priced, ensuring the accessibility that the average retail customer expects.

How To Succeed In Retail Business

When last have you heard of trusted employees who betrayed their employers trust? Here are three of the more common instances.

(One) A former Marks & Spencer department Section Manager based at the Trafford Centre, received an eight month suspended sentence and 240 hours of community service for stealing 6,700 from the stores POS terminals between July and August 2009.

(Two) In September 2009 a Tesco checkout assistant in line for promotion as the face of Tesco, turned out to be an illegal immigrant.
A major high street retailer in Manchester contacted police in connection with a warehouse worker who was suspected of stealing DVDs. A subsequent Police search of the employees residence exposed what was described as another warehouse full of goods. This was a trusted employee with over four years continuous service.

So what do these cases have in common? They highlight the fact that these retailers had failed to establish or follow standard operating procedures.
In this article I will attempt to outline the main factors that are responsible for the demise of a majority of retail organizations. I will also offer a number of best practice strategies that can be utilised by any organization.
Our research has identified four root causes of the demise of any retail venture,
The lack of robust policies
Employee error
Fraud
Policies compliance.
The creation of good policies and ensuring their compliance is vital for the success of all retail businesses, and especially large national & international retail brands. The flip side of this is that when there are strong operational standards and best practices built in success comes that little bit closer. However, having a good policy on its own does not automatically guarantee success. What is required? A simple answer is nothing short of robust checks and balances that are aimed at ensuring compliance.
There are numerous factors responsible for the success of a retail organization. Here are the three I have singled out as most relevant:
(a) Smart buying
(b) Strong sales
(c) Shrinkage reduction.

However, the implementation of these strategies is sometimes dependent on external circumstance. For example, smart buying is dependent on suppliers, the availability of merchandise, the supply chain, currency exchange and to an extent the mood of the Chinese leadership. Like smart buying, strong sales/turnover depends on the economy, fashion trends and so on. Shrinkage is the only factor that is within the control of the retailer.

Every retailer in the UK loses on average 2.5% of their turnover to shrinkage, which is a considerable amount in an industry particularly when margins are sliding.

Shrinkage occurrence can take many forms: shoplifting being the most prominent. However, internal activities in retail organizations, themselves cause more shrinkage than shoplifting. Cashier theft or error, accounts for 32% of retail shrinkage, general employees 24%, receiving 10%, errors and damage 13% while shoplifting accounts for only 21%.

I recently asked a number of retail employees if they have received shrinkage awareness training. The response that I received from all of them was shrinkage, “what is shrinkage?” Given the importance of shrinkage to the success or failure of any retail organization, one would expect it to be a buzzword in retail circles.

For the benefit of those and others like them, shrinkage is simply the difference between the value of goods received and the amount received for those same goods at the point of sale. Now the question of how does merchandise lose value from the time of delivery to the time of sale is at the heart of the success or failure of many retail organizations; it all boils down to good operational standards and best practices.

The employment of an illegal immigrant would have cost Tesco 5,000. Marks and Spencer nearly lost 7,000 though it managed to recover a bulk of it from the offender, it will take time to recover the legal fees and the damage the incident caused to its reputation, considering the fact that this individual had already been cautioned for dishonesty by another retail employer will not help.

Poor adherence to recruitment and selection procedures allowed this individual to gain employment. Had accurate reference checks been carried out, a trail might have taken them back to the previous employer. What retail jargon views as unnecessary expenditure is in truth and in fact, a factor in what is considered shrinkage. I should also note here that the other big retailer might not recover a single penny from the warehouse employee. So then it behooves each retailer to ask the question”what will an additional 2.5% of profit do for my organisations balance sheet”?

To succeed, in addition to smart buying and increasing sales retailers must focus on shrinkage management and reduction. This is a truly controllable cost. Robust policies & measurable operational standards will also ensure success.

Retail Management aims small and middle retailers in quest of automating their stores. Retail Industry is one of the greatest shifting and vivacious industries in the world. It has added to the economic expansion of many countries. Retail Management is an imperative element of the business industry that engages retail marketing and services to customers for their personal or family use. Retail industry in India rumbled in 80s and within a squat duration of time, retail sector in India has been rated as the 5th most conspicuous, striking and promising retail marketplace in the world. With the incredible augmentation of economy, Retail Management has appeared as one of the best ever mounting careers in India.

The massive development in the retail sector since past few years has unnerved a gigantic demand for trained professionals in the sector. It is an industry in quest of people at all echelons. One can engage in a job depending on ones own ability and interest, in view of the fact that retail industry is an assortment of actions initiating from advertising to branding. This crafts Retail Management one of the most sought after careers in India. Recent retail has penetrated India as seen in rambling malls, complexes and shopping centers proffering entertainment and shopping all under a roof.

Retailing set – up: Comprehensive outlook

Consumer – Centric

Internationally, Retail Management is consumer – centric with prominence on modernization in processes, services and products. The retailing sector in India is at an inflexion peak where the intensification of structured retail and escalation in the utilization by Indians is going to take up an advanced growth trail. The Indian population is observing a momentous revolution in its demographics. A large youthful working populace, nuclear families residing in urban regions, together with escalating working women inhabitants and budding prospect in the services segment are going to be the key expansion drivers of the premeditated retail segment. The association of retailers arrives at every alcove and curve of the country. So any product formed wherever in the country can be effortlessly contacted by the buyers from any place. Thus the spatial expediency of Indian dealers is elevated.

Technology- Concentrated

Retail Management is a ‘technology- concentrated ‘ segment. Victorious retailers nowadays work strongly with their merchants to forecast consumer requirement, abridge lead times, lessen stock investment and thus, save cost. Retailing Management is at a blossoming phase in our country. Nowadays, online systems connect point of – sales workstations to the major workplace where thorough scrutiny on sales by article, categorization, vendor or stores are agreed out online. Besides perceiving what was acquired and by whom, information on placid matters such as psychographics and demographics is taken into consideration.

Retailing method engages an unswerving edge with the client and the harmonization of business actions from the design phase of manufactured goods to its release and post – delivery service. In general, retail industry can be categorized into numerous categories depending on their shape, size, product lines, service proffered and prices charged etc. Some amongst them are supermarkets, specialty stores, malls, franchises, factory outlets, discount stores, chain stores, personal products, lifestyle, groceries stores and furnishing household appliances etc. With the prologue of open economy chased by roar in consumerism in India and enlargement of planned retailing, the souk had immense hope from retail sector both in terms of expansion in business and in generating job prospects. Numerous institutions present Retail Management courses with an optimism to pull towards themselves a great number of aspirants who are enthusiastic to discover their career in the field of retailing.

The competition in the branded jewelry segment in India is about to intensify with the Mukesh Ambani owned Reliance Retail Limited (RRL) recently declaring its mega foray into Jewelry Retail by opening 100 exclusive Reliance Jewels outlets across the country in coming three years.
Mukesh Ambani owned Reliance Retail Limited ventured into jems and jewelry trade because of the never ending demand of jewels in India. The first store was launched in Bangalore in early 2009. Sprawled over three storeys and covering an area of 6,000 sq ft, the Reliance Jewels store at Bangalore proffered as many as 10,000 designs of elegantly created jewelry pieces. It is learnt that the jewelry collection here, has been assimilated from different parts of India. The availability of a wide range of gold and diamond jewelry makes Reliance Jewels a one-stop shopping venue for buyers of fine jewelry.
By the end of December 2009, Reliance Group increased the number of store launches for Reliance Jewels to 10. The multi-format retailer now aims to expand by opening jewelry stores in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Dhanbad, Gurgaon, Hyderabad, Jalandhar, Jamnagar, Jamshedpur, Jodhpur, Ludhiana, Mumbai, New Delhi and Vizag adhering to core Reliance Jewels strategy of expansion through saturation.
Enthused by good sales in the past few months, Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Retail Lifestyle is now planning to increase the number of Reliance Jewels outlets to 100 by 2013. We are upbeat about our same store sales growth. The past eight months have been very good for us… with 22 per cent growth. And I think this is the best time to expand as the rentals have gone down to some extent. In the next 3 years, we will be scaling the Reliance Jewel stores to 100, Reliance Retail Lifestyles CEO Bijou Kurien told PTI.
The company has plans to add 14 more by this fiscal-end to its existing 10 outlets of Reliance Jewels, which sells gold and diamond jewellery under private label RJ. We have announced to open 10 more Reliance Jewels stores and six Time Out store by the end March with a total investment of Rs. 150 crore, Kurien said. The new stores will come up in New Delhi, Ahmedabad, Andhra Pradesh and Mumbai, where it already has its lifestyle outlets. Besides it will also open a few shops in Kochi and Bangalore.
All its outlets of Reliance Jewels are large format stores ranging from 2,500 sq ft to 15,000 sq ft. As per the plan, the gold jewelry at all Reliance Jewels stores will consist of Kolkata Filigree, Rajkot minakari jewelry, Kundan from Jaipur, Temple jewelry from Kerala, Jadau from Amritsar and so on. Even in Diamond jewelry, Reliance will offer only the best. One will find the widest variety of Diamond jewelry designs here ranging from simple daily wear to party wear items to celebrate every special occasion in a persons life.