Store Management at Big Bazaar

Objectives of the study

• To understand the Store Management of Big Bazaar Amritsar
• To understand the working of the various departments
• To enable us to gain insights into the corporate retail world

The scope of the Study

• This report is based on the study conducted at Big Bazaar, Amritsar
• It aims at understanding the company’s retail establishment, organization structure, departments, techniques, marketing strategies and its advantages over the competitors

Limitation of the Study

• As per the company rules, any information was not disclosed
• As the managers are busy with their daily schedules it is not possible for us to spend more time in interaction and discussion with them.
• The time limit is a major constraint.

Methodology

• Observing the working of various departments like Store Management, Cashiering process, Store staffing & Customer service, etc.
• Discussing with the Store managers and employees
• A brief discussion with the 3rd party vendors working in Big Bazaar

Source of Data

• Primary Data –The primary source of gathering data is mainly through the observations, of the functioning of various departments. By interviewing the managers of various departments and with the help of staff members, the base for this project is developed.
• Secondary Data-The data is collected through secondary sources such as the company manual and website, product brochure, annual report.

Store Management

Store management is extremely critical to ensure the smooth running of the store. It should be versatile and secure to convey to the right customers. With this framework, retailers ought to pass on the customized/modified offers and services that are up to the moment and attempt to target each individual.

Store management system executes the operation of the store, utilizes the corresponding mechanical assembly line. It is important to see and understand how the store is going to cater the customer requirement and meet their expectations. The consistency in the execution of relevant ranges of products, price points, and service offerings is crucial to run an effective and efficient business model.

Some significant features of retail operations which help a retail store in its functioning and performance are as follows

• Customer service and selling process
• Store staffing and scheduling
• Retail floor and shelf management
• Store administration
• Warehousing and SCM
• Loss prevention
• Cashiering process
• Visual merchandising and displays

Key Responsibilities of Store Management

• Finalize and drive store-level deals to accomplish the budgeted revenue
• Analyze the category performance with the category managers to ensure the correct product mix for the store
• Ensure adequate facilities and store ambiance for the customers
• Track and minimize shrinkage, damage, and pilferage within the norms
• Drive the retail sales
• The smooth cash management system
• Monitor and track competition and benchmarking and to initiate counter strategies
• New customer acquisitions
• Retain the present customer base

Big Bazaar

Founded in 2001 by Kishore Biyani, Big Bazaar as a retail chain operating under the parent organization – Future Group – that holds a significant prominence in the Indian retail and fashion sectors.

Big Bazaar is one of the oldest hypermarket chains that houses around 250+ stores in the country. It covers three essential categories in Indian retail: home, food, and fashion. Popular retail chains – like the Food Bazaar and FBB form an integral part of Big Bazaar’s identity. The latter (i.e. FBB) has exponentially grown into a major brand that epitomizes fashion in India.

Big Bazaar scores over other stores because of its value for money proposition for the Indian consumers. Big Bazaar guarantees the best products at the best affordable prices. With the ever-increasing array of in-house brands, they entered into the world of fashion and general merchandise, including home furnishings, utensils, crockery, cutlery, sports goods etc.

Organisational Structure

Variety of product range at Big Bazaar:

The large store comprises of everything required by people from the middle-income group. It varies from groceries, clothing, accessories, and apparels for all age groups. It also contains utility items, furniture, plastics and much more wide range of products. The added advantage of customer shopping at the big bazaar is discounted that are always offered on most of their products. It caters to every family need. With over 250 store outlets in India, Big Bazaar is one of the largest growing retail chains in the country.

Merchandising

The main function of a retail store is to sell products to its customers. Merchandising is a practice that is used to sell a product to retail consumers. One of the important features of the retail business is to decide the merchandise mix and quantity that to be purchased by the store. By the merchandising process, a retailer offers the right quantity and quality of the product at right place and time in order to meet the firm’s financial goals. Merchandise management is a combination of a series of works.

Planning consists of obtaining merchandise well in advance for the selling season. Control involves designing work to determine if the goal achieved or not. If it is diverting from the regular work we have to check and keep it aligned with the path.

Merchandising mix is used to represent the range of products retail offers to its target customer base. Developing the mix is helpful to the retailer to appeal more to its targeted customer. The number of different product items is represented by the product assortment within a particular product line.

Criteria of Merchandising Classification:

• Value of the unit product
• Repeat consumption
• Frequency of shopping
• Services for the customers
• Changes in fashion
• Complex technology
• Creating value for the consumer

SWOT Analysis Strengths:

• Big Bazaar is offering everyday low price (EDLP)
• Very strong history and experience in retail
• In-house experienced staff and marketing team
• Point of sale promotion
• Strong ethics and core values of the parent group
• Customer satisfaction level is very high for the existing customers
• Brand equity
• High diversity of staff under one roof
• State of the art infrastructure in every outlet
• Employee satisfaction rate is quite good

Weakness:

• Revenue per square feet is low
• The frequency of store opening is not up to the expectations
• Perception of customers about the store is cheap
• Popular brand products are not available in the store

Opportunity:

• With the increase in population, the size of the retail market is also increasing
• Consumer preferences are shifting every alternate day
• Retail presence is only 5% in the country, a great opportunity to open stores across
• Huge untapped market
• Income of the common people increasing
• Better Standard of living of the people

Threats:

• Strong competition
• Rapid growth and advancements in the field of technology
• A huge number of unorganized retail stores
• To cope with the changes in government policies
• Foreign direct investment in Indian retail sector

Competitor Analysis:

1) Reliance Fresh:

These stores sell fresh fruits and vegetables, staples, groceries, fresh juice, bars and dairy products. They already have 1600 stores spread across in India and Reliance is planning to spend more than $250 million in the expansion of these stores. Since the products offered are less than big bazaar, it is not exactly a competitor to the big bazaar but Reliance has attracted many customers for the purchase of their daily groceries because of the perception of their products being fresher and the stores being at a convenient location, and hence might pose a serious threat in future.

2) D-Mart:

It is a chain of hypermarkets and supermarkets in India. It is spread across 141 locations in India. It offers the products like grocery and staples, home and personal care, dairy and frozen, daily groceries, stationery, apparels and the luggage and stationary section. The offering is somewhat similar to Big Bazaar but with frequent discounts and affordable pricing, it has become a major competitor of the big bazaar in order to tap the price-sensitive customers.

3) Wal-Mart India:

Wal-Mart India operates 21 Best Price Modern Wholesale stores. It offers around 5,000 items in a Cash & Carries wholesale format. The Best Price stores offer the best prices with unmatched convenience, choice, quality, and hygiene. They are already successful in establishing the back-end supply chain in India as per the government of India guidelines. Everyday shoppers can’t buy a membership to Best Price stores or the e-commerce platform, however, it is meant for the small grocers to prosper.

4) Small Kirana’s:

There are approximately 12 Million Kirana’s in India, each of them serving 500 to 10000 families in their serving areas. The reason why the organized hypermarket and supermarkets haven’t been able to vanish their market is that of their loyal customer base. They offer products like groceries, stationery, dairy items. The main advantage these stores have is their proximity to the customers and the fact that they can extend credit offerings to their customers.

Specific Insights of Big Bazaar, Amritsar

1. Big Bazaar opened in March 2016 at Trillium Mall Amritsar
2. There are 130 employees at Big Bazaar. There are also several Third party salesman of different brands that assist customers.
3. Total store size is 36000 sq. Ft. including the warehouse. 30000 sq. ft. is dedicated for store alone.
4. Fixed allocation of the space is given to the particular section at the initiation of the store then the only minor modification is done by the Visual Merchandiser.
5. Centrally all the offers and loyalty programs are set by the company.
6. Music or “Big Bazaar” Radio, songs played are also fixed and decided centrally by the company.
7. Every Big Bazaar has the same products. No localization is allowed. No of SKU’s depends on the size of the store.
8. Recruitment: At the initiation of the Store the hiring is done by Newspaper Advertisement. After some time they receive a resume at the store for almost all the jobs. He also uses online recruitment for some specific profile.
9. Shrinkage Prevention: Electronic article surveillance EAS technology is used to prevent theft and shrinkages. Stocktake team and sales assistants do stock count and final shrinkage has been measured. Usually, a shrinkage target is around 0.5% of total sales revenue. Incentives and penalty are calculated on the basis of same.
10. POS Management- Store is equipped with high-speed bar code reader and touchscreen panel. All the cash is collected and deposited in the store every day except Sunday. Cashiers are thorough with various Loyalty cards and EMI enabled payments.
11. Mystery Shopping and audits – To protect Brand Equity of the Big Bazaar regular audits and mystery shopping is carried out. Both Behavioural and technical components have been measured. A part of incentives is also associated with points of the mystery shopping.

Role operations must ensure that every process in the store is both customers friendly and cost-effective. With proper planning, staffing, merchandise tracking, and some of these inhibitors or at least the impact of these inhibitors could potentially be avoided or minimized.

So the role of store needs to be:

• Go forward to become the to become the part more complex relationship between the retailer consumer
• It is expected to find a new balance between inspiring and emotional engagement while delivering an innovative experience
• There is a need to deliver a consistent and relevant way across all the channels Big Bazaar should consider taking some or all of the following actions:
• Increase holiday hour for shoppers who want to avoid crowds like Wednesday sale day
• Provide ample coverage at checkout lanes and multiple checkout options
• Manage merchandise inventory to avoid obsolescence and stock outs
• Train store associates to help the customer find merchandise

Advantages

1. Variety: It offers a wide variety of products of different prices and different qualities satisfying most of the customers.
2. Quality: They try to provide the uppermost quality of every product to maintain the customer requirement and quality standards.
3. Price: The price of every product is the minimum and most of the products even offer a great discount.
4. Location: The location of the big bazaar is mainly in the heart of the city. In Amritsar, it is located in Trillium mall which is one of the crowded areas of the city.
5. Advertisements: They have endorsed every popular figure in the industry including MSD, Amitabh and many more. They spent 24% of their expense on advertisement campaigns which shows all the offers and discounts going at every big bazar store.

Disadvantages:

1. Store Layout: The layout of the store at Big Bazar is not at its best, it could have been more improvement in order to enhance customer shopping experience and easiness. Most of the time customers find it difficult to locate the product they require.
2. Do not appeal to the elite: The target segment of the big bazaar is mostly middle-income group customers and some high-income group customers. The elite does not prefer to shop because of the non-availability of most brands and lower quality.
3. Poor Customer Service: The customer service at the big bazaar is not rated good. The staffs are well-trained but the queues take a long time to move due to a shortage of counters for payment.
4. Customer Satisfaction: Long Queues and delays lead to poor customer satisfaction and eventually lead to loss of certain customers who are in hurry.