Sales & MarketZing !

mens underwear index( MUI ):: is used to indicate the fact that when the economy is flat and stable so is the sale of underwear in a country ! when economy is tight so do men hold on to their underwear tightly ! critics say that this no correlation as men anyways don't change underwear in a hurry ! :) coca cola index :: consumption of coca cola has been used as an indicator of the wealth of a country , its seen that higher the wealth of a country , higher the consumption ! as the graph ( by the side ) indicates ...theres also a measure of PPP , ie purchasing price parity that a bottle of coke cost is used for , so costlier a bottle of coke the more developed the country , so is the theory atleast ! Big Mac index :: The burger methodology has limitations in its estimates of the PPP. In many countries, eating at international fast-food chain restaurants such as McDonald is relatively expensive in comparison to eating at a local restaurant, and the demand for Big Macs is not as lar...

A lot of common people think that Retail brands make a killing in terms of profits ,however the truth is that retail is a very very thin margin business , lets c how ! A good brand typically has its set of retail stores which are its advertising medium , one might say , a store for a common man looks inviting , neatly laid , and sometimes gives good deals too , but lets try breaking the store into some numbers ! a typical P& L of a store starts with the Sales /turnover Minus the Cost of good sold ( basically the cost of producing the goods ) typically varies 28 to 30 % of sales for mid segment brands and lower for premium brands as the MRP itself would be higher . Sales - COGS ,would give the Gross margin of the store , which is around 70 % ( 100- 30 ) of the store from the Gross Margin minus the COR, ie the Cost of retail . The COR of retail includes the the rental as the major component , operating expenses of the store , like salaries , electricity , pilferage ,repairs and main...

we decided to predict the way consumers would shop in the future in the next 10- 15 years , here is our prediction of shopping in the future the future consumer( the current youth and toddlers ) would be completely set of pampered lot , they wud expect everything at their door steps mobile and pc ( e comm) led market place , than only street led ie a majority currently , there would be some big brands getting created in this( mobile and pc ) space soon . shopping would be less frequent ,but done in bulk from large format stores , by a bigger mix of consumers the consumer would be the king , queen and the shopper ! the far flung hinterlands of the country also would have a shopping destination coming up or already up , near by . loyalty programs would run galore for everything , retail outlets would recognise you as soon as you walk in thru rfid or smart cards and guide you to your favourite sections traditional shops wud survive but a majority wud turn out to be delivery store...

saw a couple of interesting sites on the eretail space , which have taken up the niche of catering to online servicing of new born needs , the thought behind this is that when you have a baby at home , commuting to places to get multiple brands and get best deals wud be an hassle for sure , this idea just fits in there . so go ahead check out these firms , fighting for the babies share on the net ! http://www.babyoye.com/ http://www.firstcry.com/ http://www.hushbabies.com/ http://www.babyproducts.co.in/ like mentioned in our earlier post the ecommerce market in india shud boom , thanks to huge increase in access( 3g, bwa , wired broadband, 2g ) , lack of time among consumers , more payment options etc , firms like the above are already drawing the lines around their niche markets in the ecommerce space , the early mover advantage would help , as usual this market in India is also multiple billion dollars !

here is a simple list of 7 things one must do to get retail right , what we term as 7 up retailing! get the customer in , get your location right get more per customers and track it keep your costs down get your mix right of high margins and low margin categories insist on basic service delivery to consumers don't hang on to inventory , liquidate at the best possible rates make money ! retail is not only abt high street visibility :) Agree each one of the above is a big topic by itself !

the great 2007 buoyancy in retail which had seen a mad rush in the retail industry to sign properties , more stores was considered better , every new mall envisaged interest and signing , me too business models was ok , but all this heating up and the crisis in 2008 ,high inflation and a corresponding dip in customer purchases had to have its own hit in the market , and .. ... the past 6 to 9 months has seen the falling of some known names in the retail segment like Vishal retail ( change of ownership ) , koutons ( bifr ) , others must be surviving, but constantly in the lookout of business model changes or stores pruning etc .. In the sense Retailoring themselves ! Mass /semi premium retail business is a low margin and high traffic model , there is a constant struggle for balancing the margin mix and generating traffic ( walkins ) if both fail then the writing is on the wall sooner or later .. some of the steps for retailoring that one cud undertake are the following : i ) increas...

Going in line with our last post on the coming dotcom wave in India ...Future bazaars recent advtg blitz backed by its reworking of the site and relaunching it in one way .By doing all this the Future Group is envisaging a close to 10 perct of its total group turnover from the e route ,which is a whopping 3000 crores from future bazaar in the nxt 5 years , which is big in any terms ,close to a billion dollars , what say ! Future Group intent is clear that use other mediums to reach out consumers thru the e route which should be cheaper than the brick and mortar route , plus suddenly increases the reach among the nook and corners of the country and the globe if needed , plus also address the segment ( mentioned in this blog earlier ) which doesn't want to take the trouble of scouting out for goods , wants everything home delivered ! the lazy bums segments Being cheaper than the other traditional routes ( no rentals , no warehousing costs , no floor staff , u wud have some other cos...