The Grouse
Retail Economy
By Harish
Bijoor
We live in a world full of
complaints. The retail world is no different.
In the beginning, the micro
Mom-and-pop retailer complained about the neighborhood large store. The Micro
retailer had his own grouse. He ran his outfit with the help of wife and son
and daughter. His was really a ‘Mom, Pop & Child’ enterprise. In came the
corner grocer of relatively larger format. While the Micro-retailer managed
with a 60-sq feet enterprise, the corner grocer was all of 600 sft. He stocked
variety. He stocked both grains and packaged items. He offered better lighting
and a better display. He had a refrigerator to stock butter and bottled drinks
as well. Consumers of the
hinterland flocked to him, and the micro-retailer remained micro in terms of
size and dream alike. The corner grocer became the big bad boy of retail. Mom,
pop & Child cried hoarse.
And then came the
super-market. This happened all of
35 years ago. Into the hinterland of the corner-grocer, who had grown leaps and
bounds, came the local Super-market. This guy was bigger than them all. He had
occupied all of 3000 sft. He offered a seamless shopping experience that
brought in self-service. A customer could not only see the item he was buying,
but could touch and smell as well. He could compare one with the other. He
could peer keenly into the produce and package. He could be that much more informed
a shopper. He ate into the
hinterland of consumers hitherto dominated by the corner grocer and his smaller
cousins in the realm of the ‘Mom, Pop & Child’ format as well. The
large-format super-market became the bad boy of Indian retail now. The corner-grocer
cried foul. The ‘Mom, Pop & Child’ enterprise believed this was karma
playing out. The smirk was now on his face.
And then came real organized
retail. Organized retail spearheaded by organizations that were never imagined
to be in this space. These were Indian enterprises of every kind. In came the
Future Group. We had a Reliance Retail happen. In came the Aditya Birla effort.
In came every other effort from every other group, (the Tatas included), that
was hitherto considered an entity that had bigger axes to grind than to look
into the realm of retail as a business proposition at all.
This was big fish entering the
space of relatively moderately sized fish. This fish wanted to eat it all up in a way. It protested and
said that nothing would happen to the micro-format, the corner-grocer and the
medium-sized super-market at all. In many ways it was right. The market
opportunity was so large, and the efforts so small by these biggies as they
tested the waters, that nothing really happened to eh volumes enjoyed by the
rest of the retail chain. Big fish did not really eat small fish. And Darwin
was right. The fittest in every category survived and thrived. Every category
had a space all its own to occupy and hope to thrive in. The operative word
here is ‘hope’!
But then everyone cried hoarse.
Everyone complained. The bigger you were, the ‘badder’ you were! Forgive me for
coining that word and giving good grammar a beating. It deserves it here.
And then we have just about
emerged from the cries and the tumult on FDI in retail. Even the biggest Indian
names in retail are said to be in sync with this, only to attract FDI that goes
to mitigate its losses in this space. It is said that the biggest Indian names
would not like to compete with a 100% Wal-Mart or a 100% Carrefour effort. The
wails are still around. The complaints are still floating in a space very near
to all of us.
The latest cry is from the space
of the physical brick and mortar retailer. Brick and mortar retailers are now
crying about the current small fact that the e-retailer is making a dent into
his business. Bookshop owners are crying hoarse that consumers are browsing
physical books at their stores and buying them online at a discount. Quite the
reverse of what was being done a couple of years ago. As of today, I buy my
vegetables at home from an e-retailer.
E-retail is not ubiquitous as of now though, and I hold that e-retail is
still anecdotal in its presence, reach, acceptability and habit. Even then, the
cries are all around. The complaints are all around in our psyche.
The retail world has been a
complaint economy thus far then. It started thirty-five years ago, and the
complaints are still around. Newer ones replace older ones.
As all of this abounds, my one
suggestion to the latest complainant in the space of brick and mortar retail is
a simple one. All of us need to accept the fact that Darwin has always been
right for all of these 175 years. The fittest will survive. Retail that caters
to the needs, wants, desires and indeed growing and forever changing
aspirations of the consumer, will always survive and will always thrive. There
is space for everyone.
The fact remains that India is
large. The fact remains that the Indian is on the morph. The fact also remains that
for every one of our 1.2 Billion people, there is a solution that needs to be
different in its appeal. Each of our retail formats, from the micro-retail
format of 60-sft to the e-retail format of just no square feet at all, has an
appeal to a distinct set of customers. Everyone will survive and thrive. The fittest in every space will thrive.
Just no point complaining and
wailing about it at all. Let’s
laugh together. Hopefully all the way to the bank. The e-bank.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Harish Bijoor is a brand-strategy
specialist & CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc., a private-label consulting
practice that operates in the realm of brand and business strategy. The company
has a presence in the markets of India, Hong Kong, London, Dubai and Istanbul.
Harish is a public speaker who speaks
to Corporate audiences across the globe in the realm of motivation, people-management
issues, brands, marketing and business at large.
He is active on twitter @harishbijoor
Email: ceo@harishbijoorconsults.com
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
