Analyze the given case study 'Effective usage of Marketing Technologies for Retail Operations' and address the following questions:

Explain how the above company achieved the concept of Total Retail Experience.

. Evaluate the different retail formats used by the company in the case study.

Case Study: Effective usage of Marketing Technologies for Retail Operations

A small retail outlet started about hundred years back, could not even imagine that it would become one of the worlds largest retail chain in future. The commitment, energy, drive and enthusiasm of the founders led to the development of their business. This retail company chain attracts millions of customers everyday throughout the world. It has physical format of stores in almost all the countries in the world. It offers exciting products of the highest quality and provides a great value and customer satisfaction to the customers.

It also offered franchisees worldwide in different names to the stores. It created a far exceeding customer satisfaction by adopting to the new technologies from time to time and by changing its retail strategies in accordance with the changing retail business environment to successfully sustain in the retail business. The company believed in flexibility in its internal and external processes related to the customers. The stores were operated between 7am to 10pm in some instances and the customers were offered a wide range of products and assortment of items from baked beans to fresh produce ranges, recipe dishes and exotic foods. These items were available on all the days of the week, in all the locations, at all times of the day and night. The company believed in its founding principles of Quality, Value and Customer Service and developed uniform standards of these three in all its stores around the world, including the franchisees.

As a retail strategy to enhance the customer experience, it provided an attractive and well-designed layout of the retail outlets, created an enriching shopping environment by providing highest level of customer care. Each day more than 200,000 trays of stock are scheduled to arrive at the correct location, in the right quantities required having been distributed through its distribution network, in order to satisfy customer needs. It is a highly complex job to achieve on a repetitive basis at various locations.

The company identified that the most important retail operations activity in enhancing customer satisfaction is maintaining a very well designed network of its physical distribution. This operation enabled the company to make the products available for customers at all locations at any point of time. The next important retail operations activity identified by the company was managing the stock efficiently. It increased the Stock Accuracy to improve the efficiency of it stock management operation. The company introduced Food Stock Management, a computerized system which enhanced key information enabling them to respond quickly and flexibly to meet the customer needs. 2

One of the milestones in its retail operations was to sell food of outstanding quality offering good value for customers money. The range of merchandize included, fresh produce, ambient (non-refrigerated merchandize / long-life dry goods), cold chain and frozen foods. This range of items created long product lines for the company. To support these lines, the company developed a continuous and energetic process of new product development. Each year a large part of the product range is relaunched, upgraded or repackaged. One of the key aspects of the companysfood business is the relationship which the company has developed with its suppliers, covering a range of areas including production and manufacturing techniques, reduction in lead times, resulting in improved quality levels. The company sourced its ingredients from around the world and to ensure quality and value, it worked very closely with suppliers at each stage of production thereby ensuring hygiene and freshness. One of the example includes that its fishing vessels ensure fish is frozen within six hours of being caught. The company also developed technologies which drive quality and availability. The readymade food items were from procured from best restaurants which use the services of best chefs in their local areas.

The company also innovated its food process development without compromising on the quality of the food during the processing, packaging and delivery activities. The company developed new food products through various activities like,

Training the suppliers

Providing ideas to suppliers through research and development

Identifying the changing food tastes Identifying alternative cuisine and dishes Analyzing the local trends in food habits of customers

Customizing the food according to the local tastes and preferences of the customers Giving different names to the food products as per the local markets

Offering food gifts specifically developed for visitors to a region.

The company made a major change by implementing retail technology. This enabled it to evaluate sales and match them to the customer needs. It utilized technology and management information across a wide spectrum of activities thereby responding to changing customer requirements. Each time a purchase is made, the Point-of-Sale (POS) data is captured electronically. It linked the stores to the distribution network by recoding sales, adjusting stock and providing information to influence buying decisions. The POS information also helped to develop shape of chain information for each of its stores by identifying products which sell well and takes in to account the different sales patterns throughout the chain, including seasonal variations and consumption trends. This helped the company to monitor customer spending, avoid out of stock positions and generated specific sales and marketing data.

The next important step initiated by the company was to develop Food Stock Management (FSM) system replacing the old Food Stock Adjustment (FSA) system. This eliminated the use of paper and manual recording procedures. The FSM provided a system for the recording of all food stock adjustments and non-sale movement of stock to maintain stock accuracy. Hardware included the use of new user-friendly 3 hand-held terminals (HHTs), which recorded and transmitted bar code information to a windows-based PC and keyboard held in each of its stores. These HHTs are simple easy-to-use scanners which use bar codes to record information. Information is transmitted to a store processor before being sent to Head Office through a wider area network, connecting computers on different sites via modems to a centralized information system providing access to managers. This technology eliminated manual books such as the RTM book, the Self Supply Book and the Transfer Book used in retail operations. This technology also produced a series of reports including, price checking report, product changes report, stock record report, daily activity report, short code and produce report, interim accounting report, all of which are used by stores for information purposes.

Additionally, these key reports produced a number of benefits for management giving them the opportunity to, more effectively, manage the store. Some of these benefits are as follows:

reports were viewed as well as printed;

An automatic Start and End of Day report was available,

increased staff accountability,

improved stock accuracy,

stores were able to respond swiftly and effectively to sales trends. Food Stock Management enabled data to be captured from all its stores and provided a valuable source of information on which well-informed management decisions were made. It provided access to better quality information for a larger number of users and improved the way the company responded to customers. Some of the major benefits included were, on-line information availability, reduction in paperwork, improved centralized and decentralized control, ability to investigate problems and stock issues. All these techniques and practices led to the improvement of customer service which improved the Overall Customer Satisfaction. The company could finally achieve its objectives of providing the highest quality, more value and highest possible customer service.