One of the better known hypermarkets is aggressively advertising its new partnership with a loyalty programme. It’s also offering bonus rewards. It seems a very attractive scheme and I wanted to know what sort of impact this had made on customers. So, last Friday I decided to visit one of these stores in Pune. There
A dear friend and well-wisher, Gita Vir, was crossing the road outside her home when she was killed in a freak accident. Gita was a well-known activist and I was always assured of her support and participation in my foundation Margdarshak, which works to promote road safety and traffic awareness. Her grieving husband, retired Commodore
Replicating similar experiences to shoppers over the Internet, however, remains a tough challenge for players Last weekend, I was in Mahabaleshwar, and on the way back, my wife realised that the trip would be incomplete without any Strawberry Cream. We had just had breakfast and were quite full, but knew we couldn’t leave without having
Shopping has never been more exciting than it is now for the modern Indian consumer. There is a lot more to shop for, a larger choice of products and services, as well as different ways in which we can shop. We are moving away from the traditional and are looking forward to new shopping experiences.
Over the weekend, I decided to visit a few stores of different formats, looking for situations that could put me off shopping or even make me feel like never visiting those stores again. I’ve always believed that it’s much less expensive to retain existing customers than to attract new ones. Identifying negative shopping experiences is
I learned the most valuable lessons in retail by spending time in stores. A great way to enhance that learning is by attending conferences. I try to attend as many as I can afford (since I never seem to get any free invites!) and my most favourite events are the NRF Annual Convention and the
Most modern retailers rely on simple logic to measure their success: if sales are up, business must be doing well. What they don’t consider is, you don’t have to do much to grow in India today. Modern retail accounts for 4-5% of overall trade while the number of consumers who want to shop in this
I am a big advocate of FDI and feel that the impact of FDI in India will be much larger than just benefiting farmers or adversely affecting small traders. So, when I was told that in my last piece my views on the subject seemed ambiguous, I thought I should make them more clear. Two
It’s been more than 15 years since the start of modern retail in India and by now, it should have attained maturity. Unfortunately, it’s nowhere close to the global standards. This could be because of lack of skills or expertise, but it could also be because the Indian market is so big that major players
If we all start following other social laws in our daily life, our lives will improve without any Lokpal Bill, and no matter what political party is in power. Driving home at around 10pm yesterday, I saw a car enter and drive down a one-way. I stopped the driver, a young educated-looking man, and told
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