STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT AND RETAIL INDUSTRY Abstract: The retail business, in India, is estimated to grow at 13 per cent per

annum fro m US$322 billion in 2006-07 to US$ 590 billion in 2011-12. The unorganized retai l sector is expected to grow at about 10 per cent per annum from US$ 309 billion 2006-07 to US$ 496 billion in 2011-12. Organized retail which now constitutes a small four per cent of retail sector in 2006-07 is likely to grow at 45-50 per cent per annum and quadruple its share of total retail trade to 16 per cent by 2 011-12. The paper, which was based on the largest survey of all segments of the economy that could be affected by the entry of large corporates in the retail b usiness, has found that unorganized retailers in the vicinity of organized retai lers experienced a decline in sales and profit in the initial years of the entry of organized retailers. The adverse impact, however, weakens over time. The pap er has indicated how consumers and farmers benefit from organized retailers. The paper has also examined the impact on intermediaries and manufacturers. The res ults are indicative of the mega-and-mini metro cities around a limited number of organized retail outlets. Based on the results of the surveys, the paper has ma de a number of specific policy, strategies and recommendations for regulating th e interaction of large retailers with small suppliers and for strengthening the competitive response of the unorganized retailers. These strategic management en suring ranges from effective regulation to achieving environment. These strategi es will not only promote the efficiency of the retail business, but will leverag e the role of the retail business in promoting economic growth. Keywords: Retail Sector, Organised Retail, Unorganised Retail, Economic developm ent, Strategic management. Objectives of Paper : 1.Understand the concept of retail strategy and to know th e significance of strategic management and planning and process. 2. Explaining how a retail strategy should be implemente d in a retail store and how organised and unorganised retail business management support the implementation of retail strategy. " the result of planning should be effective, efficient and economical.... that is, suitable for the intened purpose, capable of producing the desired results and involving the least investment of resources" ---- Clark Crouch.. Introduction Retailing strategy outline the mission and vision of a retail organisation. It i s a systematic plan which provides the retailer overall framework for dealing wi th its competitors, technological and international movements. Strategic managem ent actually is of recent origin as far as retailing is concerned.In the past, t raditional retailers tended to be mainly reactive to change in the business envi ronment but with the incrasing business complexities this is no longervalid as c ompetition in all the disciplines of retailing is increasing and changes in cons umer taste, liking and disliking, technological environment and other external e nvironmnet varaiable are taking place with lighting speed. Long term strategical ly and continuous strengths, weakness, opportunities and threasts (SWOT) analys is is required to ensure that growth opportunities are not missed and action is taken at right time to combat witth potentail threats in the prevailing business environment. Driven by changing lifestyle, rising income levels, favourable demographic patte rn and the entry of corporate sector, Indain retail is growing like never before . Mall space, from a meager one million square feet in 2002 has touched over by 50 million square feet by 2008 and is stimated to cover 110 million plus suare f eet by 2012. Besides this Indian cities are also witnessing a paradigm shfiting from tradional form of kirana retailing to well organised retailing and self ser vice sector.( suvery conducted - Mumbai, Thane and Nasik district). This is also evideneced by Global Retail Development Index 2007 that has ranked India on the top in the term of Market saturation and time pressure as compared to Russia an d China. Though the market has been dominated by unorganised players, the entry of national and inernational organised players is set to change the senario. Org anised retail segment has been growing at blistering pace, leaving all previous

national and international estimates.Foreign collaborations are exploding and tr iggering the rapdly growing Indian middle class. However, the sucess of retailing industries would depend on how efficiently reta il store perform their day to day operations.The store operations play very impo rtant role in the profitability and long tern survival. The rate at which new an d new stores are coming up are getting out of competition is a serious issue for Indian retail industry.( example -subhiksha, vishal market and reliance fresh i n some part of India.) Importance of Strategic Management Retailing strategic management sets the tone for creating sustainable competativ e advantages through the optimization of available resources. To creat the winni ng edge over competitors, it requires on the part of retail organisation to deve lop its particular stratergy. Formulating a retail stratergy comes under the pla nning process. It implies that what company should achieve the store's objective s? What will be the store modus operandi? How different resources will arranged in different and effective manner ? How the plan will be executed?. The startegi c plan finds balance between the risk associated with the stores's underlined go als and the available resources.Implementation of retail strategy, on the other hand is all about ensuring that the chosen strategy should be properly and effec tively put into acction in order to acieve the stores objectives. A good strateg y without effective implementation can hardly be expected to succeed. The Strategic Retail Planning Process For the purpose of developing retail strategies, retailer are required to follow a step by step procedure or planning process. The planning process discusses/ i nvolves the present stage of business, formulation.Considering the importance of strategic decision for the future success of business, a systematic approach is essentail. The startegic management and planning process , which after consider ing the HR potential and USP of a paricular store take proper shape, is normall y divided into following steps: 1. Deciding the stores philosophy, mission and objectives. 2. Situation analysis 3. Formulation of retail strategy 4. Strategy implementation and control. It means after implementing the retail strategies, the retailer should asses how effectively strategies are being implemented, how for the strategic objectives are being achieved and what has been left to achieved in the stores objectives l ist. Therfore, retailer inspect the implementation of various retail elements. I f any deficiency is found during inspection process. that has to be corrected wi th immediate effect without any futher loss to store. Alternate Mechanism Given that the objective are well articulated,resources are well managed but whe n it comes to implemented part, due to sudden change in internal or external env ironmemenmt, old concept /formulated policies are invalid. Now, What a retail ma nager do? This is not common phenomenon but can happen with any retailer. It has rightly been said that "think for postive but prepared for the worst". Consider ing retailer who are senstive to environmental changes they always prepare a set of alternative strategies in case due to change in technology or change in cust omers preferences present schemes are not more effective. Opportunities in Retail The Indian goverment in 2005 decieded to allow foreign direct investment (FDI) t o 51%in case of single brand. This decision has opened a large number of opportu nities in Indian organised retail sector. Infact 350 new malls ,375 departmental stores and 1500 super markets are being build which shows the future of Indian retail industry. Further thase statistics will grow after the desire shown by wo rld's renowed retail players like Metro AG, Carrefour SA, and Wal- Mart for inve sting money in India. The opportunities in retailing are divided into two groups : 1.Management opportunities and 2.Enterpreneurial Opportunities. Threat in Retail and Strategic Management Indian retail industries is facing many threats that are the obstcles in its gro wing to the full potential. The behavioral pattern of Indian consumer has underg

one a drastic change with the growth of the post liberalization maturing populat ion; they have the attitude and the desire to spend. Todays Indian youth want to shop, eat , enjoy and get entertainmanet under one roof. Their choices are chan gging frequently. All these have leaded the retailing industry to serve better i n fewer prices. The biggest challenege faced by Indian Retail industries is that excluding metros, people still to prefer to shop from the traditional "kirana" stores.Secondly , even after post liberalization efforts, India continues to suf fer from a multiplicity of goverment approval , both at the central and state le vels. Bureaucracy, red tapism and corruption in the system futher make the entry in Indian Reatil industries very difficult . Therfore , a single windows cleari ng system and less paper work is an urgent necessary Research Methodology The methods adopted to fulfill the objective of the study that included collecti ng primary and secondary data. I conducted the survey in order to gather the information s from the knowledgeable person of retail stores, from the selected ret ail stores (organised and unorganised ) of Thane, Nasik and Mumbai district on the isssue reverent to my paper topic.The secondary data collected from :Magazi nes ,The Franchising World,Journals Indian Management.Web sited : www.franchisei ndia.com www.ksatechnopak.com. Conclusion : Retailing is a vast and fast growing industry as compared to other sectors of th e economy. Therfore ,managing a retail business has become a complex task. There is a shortage of skilled retailer in the corporate sector. Further retail busin ess is not competing from domestic competition but from various foreign players too. It is necessitates strategic management and planning approach that integra tes the efforts and activities of the different organised and unorganised retail departments of a retail company and results in achieveing the comapny objective s. Success of a retail is not just a process of having 4p's. It required strateg ic management, planning or strategic formulation consists of a set of decision w hich lead to development of an effective strategy. The critical examination of s trenghts , weakness, opportunities and threat (SWOT) provides the necessary info rmation backdrop to the retail planner. The next step is to formulate the retail strategy after considering various alternatives, their merits and demerits, so that most suitable alternative shuould be chosen while formulating a particular retail strategy. Bibliography (1995). Flow-through DC yields savings for Fred Meyer. Chain Store Age, 71(10), 64. (1999, June). Controlling the HBC Aisle. Discount Merchandiser, 39(6), 54-60. (2000, November). Industry Surveys Retailing: General. Standard and Poor's. (2000). Customer Fulfillment in the Digital Economy. Amazon.com: E-tail Customer Fulfillment Networks Pioneer. Digital4Sight Corporation. (2001, February). Consumer Expenditure in 1999 [WWW Document]. URL http://www.doc.gov (visited 2005, February 7). (2001, November). Industry Surveys Retailing: General. Standard and Poor's. (2002, February). Consumer Expenditure in 2000 [WWW Document]. URL http://www.doc.gov (visited 2005, February 7). (2002, November). Industry Surveys Retailing: General. Standard and Poor's. (2002). RFID: Powering the Supply Chain. Logistics Management 43(8), R3-R16. (2003, February). Consumer Expenditure in 2001 [WWW Document]. URL http://www.doc.gov (visited 2005, February 7). (2003, April). Annual Report. Amazon.com. (2003, November). Industry Surveys Retailing: General. Standard and Poor's. (2007, February). Annual Report. Netflix, Inc.. (2008, February). Annual Report. Overstock.com.

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