Retail Marketing Project

Batch II - Group V
Ishita Kapoor 13PGDM143
Kannan M 13PGDM144
Modhura Roy 13PGDM149
N.Sanketh 13PGDM150
Navisha Verma 13PGDM151
Neelesh Pande 13PGDM152

Contents
Objective ................................................................................................................................................................. 1
Scope ....................................................................................................................................................................... 1
Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................ 1
About the Store....................................................................................................................................................... 2
Store Layout ............................................................................................................................................................ 2
Retail Mix ................................................................................................................................................................ 3
Reasons for lack of conversion from footfall to shopping bags ....................................................................... 6

Objective
This project work is to compare the retail marketing strategies of Landmark and Crossword stores
on the following basis and make recommendations to increase the conversion of foot-falls for stores.

To understand the consumer buying behaviour towards these stores

To analyze the retail mix strategies followed by both the stores
To understand the strategic decisions relating to the store location, design and layout
To learn about managing the merchandise planning process and buying of the same
To study and analyze the various financial aspects
To study their current communication strategy and its impact in luring customer

Scope

A comparison of the retail marketing strategies of Landmark and Crossword

Making the required suggestions based on the study

Introduction
Landmark, a TATA Enterprise, is Indias largest book and music retailer. It started in 1987 as
Indias first large-format book and music store. It believes in building a generation of well-informed
people. Landmark, since then, has expanded into toys, stationery, gaming, electronics, gift articles,
home decor, art & craft and sports accessories. It is now a part of the retail arm of the TATA
conglomerate, Trent.
Landmark store offers a wide range of books, magazine, mobiles, cameras, gaming, music,
gifts, etc. The sub categories offered are: Foods & Drinks, Health & Fitness, Pregnancy, Philosophy,
Non-Fiction, Fiction, Religion, Romantic, biography, fiction humour, fiction science, GK, dictionary,
Leadership, economics and many more.
Landmarkonthenet.com, launched in 2000 and a Chennai based e-commerce portal owned and
operated by Landmark Limited is an online retailing division of Landmark through which it sells its
retail merchandise online.

About the Store

The Landmark store offers a wide range of books, magazine, mobiles, cameras, gaming, music,
gifts, etc. This is a chain of bookstores in India based in Chennai, now wholly owned by Trent Ltd., a
TATA Enterprise.

Store Location: Shop number T-301, third floor, Ambience Mall, Vasant Kunj.
Store Size: 22000 square feet to 24000 square feet (Approx).
Store Personnel: Three to four store personnel present during weekdays (for the Book
Segment specifically)

Store Layout

Retail Mix
Merchandise Assortment
Books:
Landmark has over 120,000 titles across different sections. The sub categories offered are:
Foods & Drinks, Health & Fitness, Pregnancy, Philosophy, Non-Fiction, Fiction, Religion, Romantic,
biography, fiction humor, fiction science, GK, dictionary, Leadership, economics and many more.
Music:
Landmark features an extensive selection of music in English, Hindi and other regional
languages. The sub-categories include Indian classical, jazz, western classical, regional, Hindi, pop,
rock, blues, country, nursery rhymes. They have an exclusive Chartbuster rack that stacks their bestselling albums of all genres. This rack is updated every week to accommodate the new additions to the
list.
Movies & Gaming:
Landmark houses a wide range of movies in VCD/DVD and Blu-ray formats. The store also
has an all new section dedicated for gamers; it stocks all the latest games and consoles. The games
include Wii, PS3, PS2 and X-Box.
Stationery:
The product portfolio includes office utilities, diaries, files, folders, writing instruments, gift
wrapping paper, table accessories, notepads, notebooks, annual planners etc. A separate section for
kids-stationery is also set up in larger stores.
Magazines:
All major English magazines published and available in India and abroad are available at the
store.
Gifts:
The Gift section caters to the need of all age groups and corporate entities. Trendy Jewelry,
crystal, watches, sunglasses, luggage, perfumes and leather products are also available.
Home store:
The home store at Landmark stocks everything from candles, mats, crockery, bathroom
accessories, lamps, furniture, wrought iron products, flowers, vases, photo frames to bedspreads,
cushion covers, curtains, wall hangings, runners, table linen and more.
Tech Zone:
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The concept of a tech zone was introduced at Landmark in the year 2009 and has been very
well received by our customers. The tech zone is upbeat and stocks a wide range of all the gizmos like
laptops, cell phones, digital cameras, DVD players, printers, scanners, iPods, GPS devices and
computer accessories in all the leading brands.
Toys:
The Kids Zone in Landmark has an extensive range of toys followed by an entire section
devoted to children's books and stationery.

Store Design and Display

The normal retail store size ranges from 12,000 to 45,000 sq. ft. Other stores located at airports
and hotels are smaller formats with area ranging 200 to 1000 sq. ft. The chain has identified 12,000 to
15,000 sq. ft. as the optimum area for its stores. If there are larger stores, it has gone in for shop-inshops from other brands to optimize the space.
The store has a mix of grid and free-form layouts. Certain sections of the stores books,
music, have grid layout and other sections toys, gifts, tech zones, have free-form layout. On over-all,
the store offers a lot of free spaces aisle and between the sections providing relaxing and pleasing
shopping environment. The stores are well illuminated, with special lights highlighting the products.
Also, background music ensures relaxing mood for the customers.
Window displays are prominent at the stores to draw the attention of the customers. Certain
sections have free standing displays showcasing the products. All the sections of the stores have
enough signage displays to help customers in locating specific products within the store. Special
graphic displays, photo panels and wall decorations are
usual sight across the store, attracting the
customers and enhancing the store image. Also, digital displays are made available at the tech zone,
where games and other electronics are placed.
In the recent years, declining sales have made the store management to focus more on the store
look and feel and increasing the overall experience of the customers.

Customer Service
Landmark has been delighting its customers offering high quality customer services. The store
finds and trains its personnel who have interest in books and music, so that they are effective in
treating customers and helping them while making purchases.
The store ensures that customers get what they want, even helping them in procuring titles that
are currently not in stock. Customer complaints and suggestions are handled through a structured
methodology that ensures immediate attention and actions. Also, the stores run regular events to give
customers an opportunity to interact with authors and musicians, ensuring maximum experience to the
customers.
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Location
The store under study is located at Ambience Mall, Vasant Kunj. Overall, Landmark has 13
stores across India in addition to seven hotel bookstores in some of the countrys leading hotels, and
five airports stores. The stores are located in the malls in tier I and II cities. All stores are conveniently
located in the malls wherein people can visit the store coupled with their other shopping trips.

Pricing
The products at Landmark have different price points according to the different brands
available. All products are sold at the MRP.

Communication Mix
Landmark offers a lot of promotional schemes to the customers to enhance its sales and attract
maximum footfall. Landmark also provides a unique name to the book segment on the display which
makes it more attractive and innovative to the customers.
The various promotional offerings along with their unique segment name that were seen
prominently include:

15% off on the last stock of best sellers

3 books for the price of 2 for New Arrivals
3 books for the price of 2 on Selfies for your goals
Comic corner displayed pitch me a story fables also saw 3 for the price of 2
10% off on comic corner
3 for the price of 2 on Business playoffs

Some Unique segment names

Handling Health Card health books

Reverence for Reference books on facts
Off side on side you decide Biography
Alive and kicking for babies special segment for babies

Reasons for lack of conversion from footfall to shopping bags

An important observation to be noted was that the conversion rate ranged between 5-8 % for
the store i.e. only 5 to 8 people of the 100 people visiting actually bought something. To find out the
reasons for this, we asked the store personnel as well as some of the customers about possible reasons.
Given below are the reasons for the same,
Lack of a buying motive of the people:
An important point that came out very strongly was a lack of buying motive by the customers.
It was reported that the store being located in a mall, attracted a lot of population. However, not all the
people visiting the store had a buying intention. It was observed that a lot of people actually visited
just because they were browsing through the mall and visited the store just like that, while browsing
through the shop. A large number of people visit the store from the food court as it located on the same
floor and just come in the store without wanting to buy anything. Yet another large chunk of people
actually because they came in earlier for a movie and had some time to kill. Hence it was evident
from the responses that many people do not have a buying motive before they enter the store.
Comparison between the physical store and the online channels:
It was observed and reported by the customers that they like to check out on a lot of new titles
at the physical store but they check for the prices of the book on online channels as well before buying
the book. In most of the cases, the prices that the e-commerce sites have to offer are lesser than what
the Landmark store has to offer. Commonly known as Showrooming, this factor is increasing
tremendously across the organised retail.
Huge store size:
The store size of the store is almost 22000 sq. feet. This store size sometimes demotivates the
people to browse the entire store. Finding a book sometimes becomes a huge and a really difficult task,
as was told to us by one of the customers. And with the personnel not available and the websites
offering convenience and a door-step delivery, conversion rate of the store suffers drastically.
Unavailability of the required title:
Many of the dissatisfied customers reported the unavailability of the book they wanted. In the
product such as books, the person makes a very informed choice, and would not usually go for a
substitute. Hence, in this scenario, the footfall does not translate into a conversion.
Lack of store personnel and lack of training:
There are a fewer number of store personnel in the store given the size and some of them are
not trained well enough to drive conversions from the footfall. Many of the customers had to wait for
the assistance of a store personnel and did not still get the required the information they wanted about
their favourite title or any information they wanted, say assistance for gifting purposes. Some of the
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people are not well informed about the presence and availability of the book in the store. All these
factors lead to a non-conversion.
Promoting the non-important titles:
It was reported and observed in the store that many of the title that were being promoted and
discounted were not really relevant. Titles related to health, or academic titles were the with heavy
discounts. This usually demotivated the people from buying any titles from the store.
Presence of a lot of other merchandise:
The store also provides a lot many other merchandise than just books. Hence, the more ardent
buyers of the book do not like the store ambience. Although this was reported by a minority, the factor
was still present.
Availability of Pdf/e-book versions of the books:
With the rising popularity and the use of the internet, many people said that the .pdf / e-book
version of any book is easily available. Hence, people come just to have a look and be informed about
the best-sellers and they can just download the e-book and read it on their electronic devices.
Huge gap between the supply and demand:
During the launch of new book by a renowned author, a huge gap between the demand and
supply arises. Many people visit the store in anticipation of the book being available but return empty
handed as the store runs out of these title very soon.
Lack of reading space in the store
Many of the customers felt that there was a lack of the reading space in the store. A lot many
stores do provide a space of read the books and if the customer likes the few pages, he usually
purchases the book. This might be another reason for the low

ROAD AHEAD: We have studied one store i.e. Landmark as of now and will study the other store
(Crossword) to make comparisons and accordingly give suggestions for the same.