Family and Store Choice - A Conceptual Framework

Retail Store choice has traditionally been studied from the perspective of an individual. The retail offering is however consumed more by the family than by an individual. This study questions the study of store choice by an individual and argues that the family is the relevant unit of analysis. The study draws on the extensive literature available on store choice and also on the family decision making for products and services. It identifies the key factors from the literature, which might be affecting the store choice of a family. On the basis of these factors, it proposes a conceptual framework for studying the retail store choice as a family decision.

Using Transaction Utility Approach for Retail Format Decision

Transaction Utility theory was propounded by Thaler to explain that the value derived by a customer from an exchange consists of two drivers: Acquisition Utilities and Transaction utilities. Acquisition utility represents the economic gain or loss from the transaction. Where as transaction utility is associated with purchase or (sale) and represents the pleasure (or displeasure) of the financial deal per se and is a function of the difference between the selling price and the reference price. Choice of a format has been studied from several dimensions including the cost and effort as well as the non-monetary values. However, the studies that present the complete picture and combine the aspects of the tangible as well as intangible values derived out of the shopping process are limited. Most of the studies, all of them from the developed economies, have focussed on the selection of a store. They represent a scenario where formats have stabilised. However, in Indian scenario formats have been found to be influencing the choice of store as well as orientation of the shoppers. Also, retailers are experimenting with alternate format with differing success rates. The author has also not found a study that has applied this theory. It is felt that the Transactional Utility Theory may provide a suitable approach for making format decisions.

Segmenting Shoppers on their Behaviour

A retail stores attracts shoppers who vary in their profiles. While some of them are serious shoppers, many of them are "visitors" to the stores. It is not possible for the store to differentiate its offerings to these segments. Classifying these shoppers on demographic and their orientation to shopping has been tried in the developed economies. However, it is felt that in an evolving market like India where shopping orientation are yet to be formed, one of the basis of understanding that shoppers could be their behaviour at the store because behavioural cues are factual data on which a retailer can develop its strategy. Through a study that involved participant observation of 284 shoppers conducted in Ahmedabad segment profiles have been developed. The shoppers were classified into 26 segments based on their behaviour. These segments have also been profiled on the basis of gender, store format and the type of product that they bought. The retail mix ingredients that could be used to deliver better value to each of the segments have been suggested. Based on the study a framework to understand shopper behaviour has been proposed.

An Insight into the Growth of New Retail Formats in India

The Indian retail sector is going through a transformation and this emerging market is witnessing a significant change in its growth and investment pattern. Both existing and new players are experimenting with new retail formats. Currently two popular formats -hypermarkets and supermarkets are growing very fast. Apart from the brick -mortar formats, brick -click and click-click formats are also increasingly visible on the Indian retail landscape. Consumer dynamics in India is changing and the retailers need to take note of this and formulate their strategies and tactics to deliver value to the consumer. This paper investigates modern retail developments and growth of modern formats in this country. We also discuss the challenges and opportunities available to the retailers to succeed in this country.

Loyalty Programmes: Practices, Avenues and Challenges

<div align=justify>Complexity of modern business requires managers to strive for innovative strategies to acquire and retain customers in any product market field. As acquiring new customers is getting costlier day by day, business organizations have offered continuity/loyalty programmes to retain/reward existing customers and maintain relationships. The premise of CRM is that once a customer is locked in, it will be advantageous to both the organization as well as customer to maintain relationships and would be a win-win situation for both. Consumers find it beneficial to join such programmes to earn rewards for staying loyal. Through loyalty programmes, firms can potentially gain more repeat business, get opportunity to cross-sell and obtain rich customer data for future CRM efforts (Yuping Liu, 2007). This paper, exploratory in nature, attempts to provide a conceptual overview of Loyalty in organized retail sector, outlines practices of grocery retail outlets in Ahmedabad, the largest city in the state of Gujarat and the seventh-largest urban agglomeration in India, with a population of 56 lakhs (5.6 million). It also throws light on consumer expectations, perceptions and problems faced through indepth exploration. Based on literature review and environment in India, an emerging economy, it attempts to predict future of such programmes specifically in Indian organised retail sector and discusses managerial challenges of managing loyalty programmes and provides agenda for future research directions.</div>

The Path to Purchase during Shopping

Increasingly shopping behaviour is being seen from the holistic perspective of the entire shopping experience. The experiential view of shopping takes a far more holistic approach to the consumption process, right from involvement to post purchase usage. The decision making process and value perceptions could vary depending on individual shopping orientations, the cultural orientations as well as the economic and competitive environment in which the consumer shops (Woodruffe, Eccles and Elliott, 2002). This study will attempt to understand the impact of the major factors on the purchase behaviour of shoppers by examining purchase paths across different product categories signifying different shopping orientations; across culturally distinct regions; and across different stages of retail evolution.

An Investigation of Incongruency and Distraction Hypotheses: The Context of Dubbed TV Commercials

When one looks at the Television commercials scene in India, one easily sees three distinct patterns of communication. One is the nation-wide campaigns that are language neutral, meaning, they are purely music based. The other kind is a pure regional communications, with regional content starting from the language to the props used. The third variety is more like the ‘transition-ads’ that are between a pure nation-wide and a pure regional communication. These are basically nation-wide commercials dubbed in the regional languages, while not changing any part of the visual: thus they are ‘national’ with their visuals and regional with their sound track. The current study seeks to understand the effectiveness of such dubbed advertisements. Here incongruency and distraction hypotheses are investigated through two experiments. A social message against the use of cell-phones is used with students as target audience. The results of the first experiment while indicates distraction effects, the ANOVA tests have a very low power. The second experiment apart from repeating the first experiment with a little larger sample also looks at amount of counterarguments in the treatment conditions. The results of the second study do not validate any of the hypotheses. However the recall results are intriguing. Divided attention and incongruency are found to be two competing theories in explaining the recall effects of dubbed advertisements.

An Exploratory Study of Factors affecting MBA Students Attitude towards Learning via Case Study Pedagogy: Insights from Advertising Literature

Case based pedagogy has become popular in most business schools today, since the pioneering efforts made by Harvard Business School, several decades ago. Although the case method approach stands firmly on grounds its effectiveness in ‘simulating reality of the business world’ in the classroom, yet it has its own limitations and cannot be used in all learning situations This article delves into both sides of the debate on the efficacy of case method for learning and through an exploratory study, models the attitude of MBA students towards the perceived learning aspects of the pedagogy. The premise of our beliefs-only attitude model rests on the conceptual analogy between a case study and an advertisement message as two similar forms of communication technology. Drawing heavily from the insights available in the advertising literature, the article suggests several hypotheses for future empirical validation.

Store Format Choice in an Evolving Market . A TPB Approach

<div align=justify>The store choice has been studied extensively in the literature, but store format choice has had limited research attention. The store choice modeling has been primarily done in the random utility theory framework, which however is a neo-economics based view of choice decision that ignores the psychological and behavioral aspects of this planned behavior. The store format choice for bulk grocery purchase despite being a rational context has not been conceptualized in the most accepted construct in attitude behavior, the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB). Attitude-behavior linkage has been studied extensively in literature but there is still no consensus on the components of attitude, their interrelationship and resultant impact on conation. The Theory of Reasoned Action has evolved over time to incorporate perceived behavioral control and past behavior to improve its explanatory capacity as TPB; however, it has maintained its unidimensionalist approach and has not tested affect and cognition independently for its impact on behavior. It may therefore be relevant to explore the possibility of testing the proposed Converging framework of Affect and Cognition and comment on the relationship of the structural components of attitude and its impact on format choice. The impact of past behavior on future behavior in Theory of Planned Behavior has been ambiguous while there has not been much emphasis on the quality of past experience. The current research takes up the past experience quality and tests it in the attitude behavior relationship as an antecedent of actual behavior. This paper conceptualizes the store format choice behavior in the Theory of Planned Behavior framework by exploring the strength of attitude-behavior relationship mediated through behavioral intention and its impact on format choice as also the independent role of affect and cognition on the format choice.</div>

Point of Purchase Communication: Role of Information Search, Store Benefit and Shopping Involvement

Point of Purchase (PoP) is the place where a customer is about to buy the product. This is the crucial point where the exchange takes place. It offers us a last chance to remind or attract customers. In spite of a considerable expenditure on point of purchase material by companies, there is a lack of an established method of measuring the effectiveness of communication at the retail outlet. The current study is an attempt to define and measure the extent of usage of PoP by consumers while shopping. It explores the phenomenon with the help of an experimentation using two main variables; level of information search and store benefits sought. It uses shopping involvement as a mediating variable. During the course of study scales for usage of PoP communication and shopping involvement were developed. In-depth interviews were carried among shoppers to understand their motivations and gratifications with regard to shopping. The interview findings were used to develop scales, which were tested before being used during the experiment. The experiments involved building scenarios specific to shopping situations. Participant observations were carried out at stores with different formats. The study found that all the three variables were significant in terms of main as well as interaction effects. Based on the findings the authors suggest a framework for enhancing the effectiveness of PoP Communication.