Ankur Agrawal - FT13111

Venue – Shakthi Super Market, Mahabalipuram

Time – 1700 hrs

Date – 17/05/2012

I was always curious to know how the supermarkets are able to store tons and tons of consumables in their store but I was more curious to know how they are able to display all their products with such neatness and simplicity that a user can instantly view anything they wished to. Fascinated by the Grid View layout taught in the class by the Professor which is used mostly in all the Supermarkets to help their customers have a better view at all the groceries, daily consumables, etc I decided to do a survey on the supermarket to really understand and relate both the things together. As I was walking down the busy lanes of Mahabalipuram popularly known as ‘Mahabs’, I came across a supermarket known as ‘Shakthi Super Market’. I instantly decided that lets to inside this supermarket and get the things going. I was very careful in choosing this supermarket since I had to make sure the supermarket should not have too many customers or I would end up wasting the time I had allotted and I won’t be able to get much of the data.

Inside Super-Market

So, I went inside this super market and started analyzing things from the angle of a guy who wants to know things. So, I saw there were some customers inside the supermarket. They were busy in their search for the things they wanted to buy. I was very surprised to notice that every customer knew what exactly they wanted to buy. Yeah, they were choosing between the different brands but they had a clear image of their final product in their mind.

I noticed that this supermarket was not using any banners or any other posters to market any brand or any specific product. 1 reason I knew was that the shop itself was not very big and people could easily find any product they wanted to buy. Other reason I could figure out was that since it was a small supermarket people would exactly know what all different products they could expect from this supermarket so as such there was no reason for it.

Customer Interaction

I thought that now let’s have a talk with couple of customers to get their point of view as well on this supermarket. So I started to enquire a few customers so as to get a review/feedback on this supermarket. On having a casual chat of around 30-45mins with few customers I was surprised to get some facts about this supermarket.

1.       A large number of the customers despite the fact of having much more bigger and better supermarkets in vicinity preferred to buy from this supermarket. Reason being the good hospitality of the shop owner.

2.       Since it was a small supermarket, the shop owner was more focused towards the products which customer bought on a regular basis and hence they always made sure they are providing the stuff the customer wanted.

3.       Few of the customers expressed that if the shop would have been more diversified and little bigger they would not have to go other shops to buy certain things they wanted to. But then again they also knew that it won’t happen in a day or a month.

Features

1.       Credit Card Facitlity – Shop provides customers to swipe their cards to pay the bills.

2.       Home Service – Shop also provides customers with home facility provided their homes are nearby and their purchase is above certain price.