Virtual Store Visit to Croma By guest speaker: Mr. Aditya Pawar

About the speaker:

Mr. Aditya is an alumnus of ITM Business School. He is an experienced Retail Management and Marketing Professional, currently working as Assistant Category Manager (Television Business) with a stellar cross functional experience of about 8 years with Retail Industry as in Market Analyst, Store Manager, Cluster Program Manager and Buying & Merchandising.

Attendees:

Around 110 students as well as our respected professors joined us in the workshop. Students across various specializations such as Operations and Supply chain Management (O&Sc), Retail Marketing and Management (RMM), and Business Analytics (BA) including the seniors as well as juniors participated.

Agenda

• Introduction to Croma as a brand
• Types of stores
• Store Operations
• Space Management
• Store Atmosphere

Introduction to Croma as a brand:

Infiniti Retail, a subsidiary of the Tata Group, runs Croma stores in India which is a retail chain for consumer electronics and durables.  Launched in 2006, Croma was the first one-of-its kind large format specialist retail store that catered to all multi-brand digital gadgets and home electronic needs in India. Over a decade since its inception, today Croma caters to over 10 Million customers and has almost become synonymous for all electronics needs, with its tech-savvy staff, product range, online presence and the will to help customers.

Bringing alive the promise of a ‘Brighter Every Day’ for its customers, Croma offers a world-class ambience to shop both in-store and online at www.croma.com, giving customers a seamless ‘omni-channel’ shopping experience that lets him/ her enjoy the best of both the online & the offline worlds. Croma is also the first omni-channel electronics retailer uniting the varying customer touch-points: a full-fledged Croma Store and the Online Electronics Shop

Croma ensures there is something for everyone with over 6000 products – Digital Gadgets like Mobile Phones, Laptops, Tablets or Entertainment Solutions like Televisions, Sound Bars & Home Theatres or Cameras & Accessories for photography enthusiasts or Home Appliances like Air Conditioners, Refrigerators, Washing Machines or Cooking & Kitchen Appliances like Air Fryers, Soup Makers, Cooktops, Dishwashers. With over 200 brands and 150+ stores across 40+ major cities of India, Croma ensures that for each customer, a Brighter Tomorrow begins Today! From the newlywed couple setting up their house to the son reducing his mother’s burden with a washing machine; from the daughter gifting her parents a new LED TV to the newly promoted manager buying an inverter air-conditioner to make the summer bearable, Croma ensures that customers always get ‘More for their money’! Croma also brings Croma Privileges; its Gift Card solution that gives customers the freedom of choice, with Gift Cards and e-Gift Vouchers of multiple denominations.

Presently, there are a total of 143 Croma stores in 32 cities in India.

Types of stores:

• Zip Store: Zip stores are significantly smaller stores which measure about 1200 sq. ft with a different assortment and design as compared to firm’s regular stores. The brand was initially started to signify smaller stores and currently has about eight stores at airports.
• Normal Stores: These stores are the normal retail stores that we see n everyday life. These can vary in sizes and basically, they have almost every product on sale that they have to offer.
• Croma Gadgets of Desire Store: These stores host a curated range of innovative and unique tech products that are a perfect fit for todays digital savvy and gadget loving customers. The stores unique interactive touch-based sound experience zone lets customers experience over 70 speakers with just a touch.

Store Operations

The store operations are very important tasks that need to be performed everyday while opening and closing of a store. Such as, while opening of the store the presence of store manages, cashier and a few staff members is compulsory.

Similarly, while the closing of store the manager has to be present and various other functions have to be carried out. The store is checked thoroughly before closing and a temporary seal is done to all the locks.

SOP: All the stores have certain Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) which they have to follow like the store check list, cash flow management, KRA reports etc.

Description of Merchandise:

Variety:

These are the different categories of products that are available in the store such as Televisions, Air Conditioners, Washing Machines, etc.

Assortment:

Within variety, each category has assortment. It depends on the brand and the product type. E.g. In Television category there can be panels on Sony, LG, Samsung, etc.

• Range: It is the breadth of any category to decline further.
• Sub segment: It is the further categorization of each range.
• SKU: It is the smallest unit of any category.

Space Management

It is the process of managing the floor space adequately to facilitate the customers and to increase the sale. ... Space management is very crucial in retail as the sales volume and gross profitability depends on the amount of space used to generate those sales.

Store Atmosphere

Store atmosphere includes the physical characteristics of a retail store used to create an image to attract customers. It's also known as atmospherics for short. It is a direct contributor to the customer experience and the public's opinion of your brand, which are important elements of retail today.

End Note:

It was a great and unique experience. We enjoyed and learnt a lot from the session about the retail stores and the methods they use to please the customers. We all Thank Mr. Aditya Pawar for giving us such insightful knowledge.