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Indian grocery retail market has seen ups and downs since the time; it started to set its foot on Indian soil. Now when some companies have already seen the afternoon, some could not see post dawn.
Indian grocery retail market is one of the biggest businesses now and will continue to flourish in future as well.
India’s retail market is expected to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 10 percent to US$ 1.6 trillion by 2026 from US$ 641 billion in 2016. While the overall retail market is expected to grow at 12 percent per annum, the modern trade would expand twice as fast at 20 percent per annum and traditional trade at 10 per cent#.
Here are some of the reasons, why some of the supermarkets could not grow like Big Bazaar or Reliance Fresh:
Identifying the customer:
There are around five types of customers, which visit the supermarkets. They can be categorized as a quality seeker, value seeker, and clear-headed, decisive, novelty seeker.
Some want to get the quality products and care less for the money part, some are very peculiar about the price of the product and are ready to compromise with the quality.
Some fall under clear-headed, where they are quite sure what to get and how much to pay, then there are some who fall under the category of decisive, they are a bit dangerous because they want discounts, little extra and bargain wherever possible.
At last come the novelty seekers, who want to try the new products and are easily fascinated by advertisements.
Most supermarkets fail to identify their customers and eventually fall flat on their face.
Lack of Discipline:
The supermarket culture has been adopted by the western countries, who too have gone into the minute detailing before starting supermarkets. it requires research, proper planning, and discipline to start any business.
When supermarkets started popping up in India, people blindly ran after just the idea, without following the pattern. Some small supermarket owners did not do the research, planning and left discipline right outside the door. Aiming only at the profit, they failed to maintain discipline, the inconsistency of product delivery, improper arrangements of products, huge lack of manpower.
This all combined together gave a massive blow to their business.
Shortcuts:
There is no shortcut to success and it remains true to all small or big companies, who want to make it big overnight.
Some companies tried to opt for the shortcuts and opened their supermarkets in anywhere they could acquire a piece of land, without going much into the market study or demands of the locality.
Some opted for cheap manpower, especially for a place like supermarkets; the minimum requirement of the staff boy should be polite, well spoken and educated. Some companies thought of skipping the basic important steps and jumped to the conclusion of opening a supermarket, which made all the difference in other players, who made it big and are still flourishing.
