Evergreen Retail Segment

 




We have seen different segments in retail markets and their ups and downs in the last 5 years. In the last 5 years, the real market had a  turning point in the last 18 months due to the pandemic situation. A lot of government regulations in the retail segment and even consumer behavior changed. 

When we say segments we can broadly classify them into the following :

1. Food & Beverages - Restaurants, coffee shops, ice cream parlors, bakery, etc

2.. Grocery & Vegetable - Kirana store, Supermarket, Vegetable store, Hypermarkets, etc

3. Pharma Store - Medical store 

4. Clothing & Footwear - A readymade showroom, textile showroom, etc

5. Stationery - Book store, Stationery store 

6. Jewelry - Gold / Silver showrooms 

7. Electronics & IT -  Mobile shops, Home appliance, Computer hardware stores


A lot of formats of stores are available in all the segments which have emerged in last 5- 10 years. All the segments have seen a growth in the last decay. The challenging period was the last 18 months where consumers had a fear for safety and survival. Humans had a tendency of buying any products in abundance not actually for their needs. Marketing is the key and digital marketing or social media has played a major role in consumer purchase behavior.  Marketing actually manipulates the consumers and makes the products attractive and pushes for the purchase.

During the lockdown, only essentials were allowed to open the stores. Essentials were only F&B, Grocery/Vegetable, and Pharma stores. In these 3 only Grocery & Vegetable and Pharma had functioned without restrictions. F & B had a lot of restrictions. Even the Medical store had seen a change in the behavior of the sales due to the pandemic.  

From all this Grocery & Vegetable came out as the undisputed winner.  This segment had its own challenges. A few of the challenges for these segments are :

1. E-commerce 

2. Door Delivery

3. Planning inventory 

4. Technology adaption

5. Short term working capital requirements


E-commerce has made the traditional players forced to make changes or tie-up with any of these platforms. Door delivery is the need of the hour. Inventory, Planning, and finance requirements are interrelated and this is also a challenge in this segment. A lot of startups have entered this segment to support them.

With all these challenges Grocery & Vegetable survived the two waves and is there to stay for the long term. A recent study conducted in few supermarkets in Bangalore during the recent lockdown where the store opening time was from 6:00 am to 10:00 am  brought a lot of light for the need to adapting to new technology  


The business has only a slight increase in revenue but no of bills during the lockdown has reduced, which means the value per bill has increased. This is the time retails need to adapt to the changes with the help of technology to gain more margin in a short span of time.


Technology has become a key part of all the business segments including the retail segments. Only Smart stores survive or gain growth.



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