RETAIL MARKETING

Department of business Administration

Ayesha Tahir Awan MBA1y02181015

Khadija Fiaz MBA1y02181046
Mahnoor Zubair MBA1y02181047
Anum Batool MBA1y02181033

Subject:
Retail Marketing
Assignment No:
#3
Submitted to:
Waqar ul Qayum
Date: 15-12-2018

The University of Lahore

Merchandise Assortment:

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When making sales forecasts for a specific merchandise category, retailers take information from

various sources, such as past sales volume, published secondary data and customer surveys.
Determining a merchandise strategy is a crucial issue for a retailer. Merchandise assortment is
the range of products a store sell.

What is an assortment in retail?

Product assortment is the different types of products that a business makes or a retailer offers for
sale. Product assortment consists of the following characteristics: Breadth: The breadth of a
company's products relates to the number of product lines a company produces or
a retailer carries.

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 Wide vs deep assortment:

A deep assortment of products means that a retailer carries a number of variations of a single
product (the opposite of a narrow assortment). Carrying a deep assortment of a particular product
can lead a company to become a "super specialist." It also limits the space for other products that
would allow it to reduce its risk. Some types of businesses are able to offer a deep assortment of
a product while at the same time offering a wide variety of products.

A wide variety of products means that a retailer carries a large number of different products (the
opposite of a narrow variety). Such as in supermarkets.

Advantage and Disadvantage:

Wide & Deep (many products lines & large varieties in each)

Advantages:

• Broad market

• Full selection of items

• High level of customer traffic

• Customer loyalty can be achieved

• Customers find One stop shopping, and can easily get every product that they want to buy.

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• No disappointed customer

Disadvantages:

• High inventory investment because it will be requiring investment to acquire inventory.

• General image

• Many items with low turnover

• Some obsolete

 Wide Vs Shallow:

A number of products items are stocked but there is only a small number of products items for
example in a convenience store. Convenience store offer a wide variety of products such as
fruits, bread, milk, vegetables. The wide and shallow bucket is made up of companies that have
assembled (either by buying or building) complete technology stacks, allowing marketers to
manage multiple channels, points, and platforms in one place.

Advantage:

Wide & Shallow: (many products lines & limited varieties in each)

• Broad market

• High level of customer traffic

• Emphasis on convenience customer

• One stop shopping

• Less costly than wide and deep

Disadvantages:

• Low variety within product lines

• Some disappointed customers

• Weak image

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• Many items with low turnover

• Reduced customer loyalty

 Narrow and Deep:

A small number of products items are on offer but there are huge item and quantity of each.
Examples are stores that sell only toys and flags etc. The narrow and deep bucket consists of
companies that focus on a few specific channels, often referred to as point-solutions. The
“channels” or “points” that these organizations solve for can be media channels such as search,
social, or display. They can also be delivery platforms like email, mobile, or affiliate.

Narrow &Deep: (few products lines & large varieties in each)

Advantages:

• Specialist image

• Good customer choice in categories

• Specialized personnel

• Customer loyalty

• No disappointed customers

• Less costly than wide and deep

Disadvantages:

• Too much emphasis on one category

• No one stop shopping

• More susceptible to trends and cycles

• Greater effort required to increase the store size

• Little/no scrambled merchandizing

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Narrow and Shallow assortment:

A shallow assortment contains a limited quantity of products items, Narrow assortment contains
a limited variety of products line. Only a small number of few products items are on offer to
consumers. New-stands with one and newspapers are examples.

Narrow &Shallow: (few products lines & few varieties in each)

Advantages:

• Aimed at convenience customers

• Least costly

• High turnover of items

Disadvantages:

• Little width and depth

• No one stop shopping

• Some disappointed customers

• Weak image

• Limited customer loyalty

• Small trading area

• Little/no scrambled merchandising

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Example of red ocean strategy:

 TAPAL

 KHAADI

TAPAL:

Tapal Tea is a Pakistani major tea brand based in Karachi, Pakistan. It was founded by Adam

Ali Tapal in 1947. Tapal Family Mixture, launched in 1947, was the first brand of the Tapal Tea

Company. Family Mixture originated from a small shop in Jodia Bazar and is now one of the

most popular brands in Karachi. Pioneer in the mixture category, the blend of dust brings out tea

color and leaf brings out the taste.

Segmentation for TAPAL:

TAPAL did very accurate segmentation in Tea. Their main objective to focus on upcoming and

capabilities of requirements in tea sector.

Lipton and Tapal both are leading tea brands of Pakistan and competitors. Currently

advertisement battle between Tapal and Lipton is bringing some heat. First Lipton launched their

ad of Hamza Ali Abbasi   “Lipton P Yo Aik Baar Bhool Jaogay Danedar, Pasand Na AAye

Tou Paisay Wapis.”  They target there competitive brand Tapal Danedar and in response to this

ad Tapal launched their ad named as “Tapal danedar tea taste challenge” where Aly Khan says

“Chai ka label yellow ho ya orange, chai tou tapal danedar he hai” which actually targets

Lipton Yellow Label. Present capabilities of requirements in tea sector.

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According to DAWN newspaper ARORA magazine article, recently survey TAPAL is best tea

of Pakistan and has greater market share.

Question: 2

Why good companies go bad?

It can be anything or any combination of things that began the all too quick slide into financial

trouble. A survival threatening crisis is significantly different from years of running a business in

good times and bad. Sadly, in a crisis situation, decisions tend not to be made. Unfortunately for

the business, failure to act is a default decision to do nothing. This is often the most expensive

decision of all. Suddenly marketing, sales, production and accounting all have different agendas,

views and are going in different directions.

Given the nature of market forces and change, every enterprise is as vulnerable to trouble as it is

to the lure of success. Assigning blame at this point will do nothing to alleviate the problems:

you won't even feel better. The blame game can clearly wait. Post mortems reveal the causes of

death after the victim has already died. Remember, it may not be your fault, but it is your

problem. Firestone Tire & Rubber is a perfect example of active inertia. For years Firestone was

the leading tire manufacturer in the United States. Firestone built strong relationships with the

Detroit Big Three automakers and grew steadily for years. In fact, Firestone grew so steadily that

they saw their only challenge as keeping up with the growing demand for their product. Like all

good things, Firestone’s steady growth did not last forever.

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Unfortunately some ultimately manage to recover usually after painful losses but many don’t.

 Strategic Frames become Blinders.

Strategic frames are the sets of assumptions manages make about the business world; they help
managers answer complex strategic problems by giving them a framework to begin with.
Strategic frames can be very beneficial in allowing managers to find solutions to difficult tasks,
but they can also hinder. When managers find the same frames working over and over they begin
to believe that those frames are the solutions, the only things that matter. However, when an
environment changes, the strategic frames need to change also.

 Processes Harden into Routines.

Companies often find it hard to change processes that have worked for many years, but
sometimes that is the one thing that is really needed. Sticking with the same business processes
within a changing environment is like digging yourself into a hole or getting stuck in a rut on the
road to continued success. Long used processes become comfortable and routine, but routine is
not good for innovations because it keeps companies from looking for a better solution. Firestone
had this exact problem with the new radial tire design.

 Relationships Become Shackles.

Relationships always have been and will be an important part of a successful business, but
sometimes these relationships can run too deep creating inflexibility for the company. Apple
Computer found this out first hand when the innovative engineers that contributed to the
technical advances of Apple in the early days refused to change any of their ways.

 Values Harden into Dogmas.

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Values are the inspirations of businesses. They let the customers know what the company is all
about and unify the employees of the company. Firestone’s values were loyalty to the company
and commitment to the community. These values start out as pure and great things for a
company, but as the company grows and matures these values can move from being a positive
thing to rigid rules that bind the company.

Is your company complacent?

Some describe complacency in business .where organizations are uneager to improve and change
as a silent business killer that strikes without warning and can bring even the biggest and the
rightest companies to their knees.
 Remember always “keep your eye on the ball” 

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