Gender Differences Relating to Hyperstar Promotion,

Convenience, low price and other Characteristics (Part 1)

Posted by admin on December 3, 2012 in Marketing No comments

Final Project, Project Report, research, paper, articles, Questionnaire, analysis, marketing

research, departmental stores report

Table of Contents

(1.0)Abstract

(2.0)Introduction

      (2.1)Scope & Purpose

      (2.2)Hypothesis & Variables

      (2.3)What Hyperstar Do & How

(3.0)Literature Review

(4.0)The Methodology

      (4.0.1)Nature & Research

      (4.0.2)Target Population

      (4.0.3)Data Sources

      (4.0.4)Research Approach

      (4.0.5)Sample Size & Sampling Procedure

      (4.0.6)Data Collection Method

      (4.0.7)Research Instrument

      (4.0.8)SPSS Data Analysis

(5.0)Limitations

(6.0)Conclusions

(7.0)References
Appendix – I (Questionnaire)

Appendix – II (Pie Charts)

Abstract

We are focusing on super store characteristics which are importantly perceived by the genders.
This research study concept is taken from the base article “Supermarket consumers and gender
difference relating to their perceived importance levels of store characteristics” by Mortimer,
Gary & Clarke and Peter to work on the basis of gender perception difference in super store. The
specific store is Hyperstar on which research is conducted and the result shows female love to
shop and they want efficient operator, Bi-weekly promotion and discount while the men spends
less time on shopping and they need convenience factor more like easy access to car park and
location. Sample size of 280 respondents is taken and conducted in the environment of Hyperstar
through administer questionnaires. This research has used 16 journals for the ground work to
support its results.

Introduction:

Retail industry in Pakistan has gained much awareness after the entrance of these megastores
before this it was ran by traditionally owned retailers which were not much educated. Super
store, departmental stores and utility stores or discount stores concept was unheard till the
independence of Pakistan. Canteen store department CSD and utility stores were considered to
be the Mini supermarkets. Today retail stores accounts a good no for the economy of Pakistan
and retailers are working on their best. Today retail store industry is highly competitive because
the real supermarkets and departmental stores came into existence and giving a good competition
to each other. Retailers are quiet worried about the changing trends quickly because they need to
match and compete the strategies developed by other retailers.

This research is conducted on a super store to distinguish the gender perceived importance of
level while he/she shops. In Pakistan currently only four super stores are working in Pakistan in
which few does not completes the definition of a super store so they are considered to be mini
super markets they are as follow:

 Hyperstar
 Best way
 CSD
 Utility store
 Metro cash n carry
 Makro

The research is conducted in the territory of cantonment board Lahore where Hyperstar is
situated. Hyper star belongs to the Carrefour group based in Germany but in Pakistan it is
currently ran by the Majid-Al-Futtaim-Retail belonging to a gulf country .It established in 2009
and more than 100000 products are available under one roof. Basic motive was to provide
consumers convenience, leisure, cleanliness and competitive prices which they can’t find less
than one roof this is one of the major reason that today Hyperstar is the most active supermarket
in Lahore.Genders differ in their choices and their like and dislikes but do genders differ in their
perception while they are doing shopping if so what are the characteristics that differentiate
them. This has become an important question for a researcher today. Gender differs in store
characteristics and those characteristics which we found through our research are as follows:

Female

 Females like to shop but they want friendly operators who could help them
while shopping as in Hyperstar.
 Female enjoys shopping and they want promotional items more
 Pakistani females are price sensitive so they need discounted prices
 Packaged and hygienic food is also the priority for the family health car

Male

 Males are not fond of shopping they need ‘’convenience’’

 They buy products which are easy accessible
 They buy things where parking is easily available like Hyperstar

Today gender is one of the key factors for a retailer because a new emergent male group is
stressing the nerves of retailers to do something for them or make strategies for them. Our
academic research is purely relied upon the gender to see what genders prefer while they are at
superstore like Hyperstar. Result of this study is proposed in the coming pages and we tried our
level best to explore this study to help future researchers.

Sample size of 280 administer questions helped us to fill the questionnaires while we roam
around the Hyperstar asking questions from every upcoming person or going out from Hyperstar.
Result is evaluated through the SPSS which played major role in terms of figures.

(2.1) Scope of the research

‘’Hyperstar consumers male & female targeted from the age of 18to 48 and their differences
relating to perceived importance levels of store characteristics’’

(2.1.1) Purpose of the study

The basic purpose of the study is to find the gender difference relating to Hyperstar
characteristics (Cleanliness, Promotion, Discount, low price) and which of these characteristics is
more important in the perception of genders. We conducted this research in Hyperstar through
administer questionnaire and filled 280 questionnaires and came to know that gender differs in
their perception while they shop at Hyperstar .Few variables on which we focused and took out
from the ground article were Promotion and discounts, Product availability, Advertised specials,
Competitive prices, Cleanliness and hygienic food and convenience and location factor.

Furthermore through this research we came to knew about Pakistani consumers how they behave
in a particular way while shopping and what could be the strategies that a retailer needed to focus
on.

(2.2) Research hypothesis

“Hyperstar Characteristics (promotion, Convenience, Cleanliness, Product availability) relating

to gender differences and their perceived importance of level”

(2.2.1) Dependent variable

 Gender

(2.2.2) Independent Variable

 Bi-Weekly promotion
 Trained staff
 Easy access to car park
 Well stocked shelves
 Convenient location
 Healthy fresh food
 Competitive price

(2.3) What Hyperstar Do and how?

Hyperstar the only mega superstore in Lahore with wonderful shopping characteristics running
throughout the year for consumer and giving lasting experience while we conducted research on
Hyperstar some of the interesting things were known to us and we constructed them as our
variables too. Promotion, Staffing of serviced departments, Advertised special promotions,
Efficient & accurate operations, Easy access to car park, Convenient location, Product
availability, Cleanliness ,High quality fresh food with stable low prices are some of the important
variables we considered for our research and applied on the Hyperstar that how they work and
how they satisfy genders on these characteristics. In depth detail is as follows:

(2.3.1) Promotion &Specials

 Bi-weekly promotion (10%): In store after every 15 days the promotion gondola
changes on various products these days the promotion is put with minimum 10 %
discount on more than 2000 grocery products.
 Special gift cards: it runs for whole year you can buy that gift card for worth 1000
rupees and you can give to your loved ones very few people are familiar with this
opportunity you can easily find it on cash counters.
  Occasional specials: Products which are specially promoted on occasion for e.g. on Eid
and Christmas cakes and clothes are discounted with special offer another e.g. could be
valentine day on which Chocolates are on promotion with advertised leaflets.

(2.3.2) Staffing of serviced departments

 No waiting: This characteristic is primarily concerned with the staff standing near aisles
we can say the sales person they are hired on every concerned aisles and gondola so that
customer needs not to wait for any query.
 Served quickly: what customers say it is done by the sales person. For e.g. if a customer
wants to know the size of the desired shirt salesperson will guide him.
 Trained staff: Each and every single person of department knows what he has to do.

(2.3.3) Advertised special promotions

 Specials I want: Specials which customer thinks before coming to the store and he/she
gets that desired thing because vast variety of branded and non-branded products is
available. For e.g. A customer thinks to buy a HP laptop from their and he/she gets it.
 Product of the day: Validity for five days but items vary for e.g. product of the day on
Monday are meat, Vegetables or mazes etc.

(2.3.4) Efficient & accurate operations (Relating cash counters)

 Friendly operators: Most of the Hyperstar cash counter operators are friendly as per
training consumers perception also differs.
 Efficient operator: Yes they doing their work efficiently
 Accurate operators: Cashier takes special care of  while taking and receiving cash

(2.3.5) Easy Access:

 Easy access to car parks: enough cars & bike parking more than 800 cars can be parked.
 Easy parking: even for handicap people special parking is made on both the roofs.
 Parcel pick up area: after the payment is given it will be parceled to your home within 2
days but this concept is quiet week in there.
(2.3.6) Product availability

 Well stocked shelves: Yes on every shelf we can see the leaflet or the guidance which
reflects the organized shelf’s of the store. On every aisle a salesperson is standing which
keeps on organizing the products if they get scattered.
 Products I want: It’s not possible the product which customer demanded is not there
either the other brand is available or substitute of it .Products like fruits & vegetables
items are seasonal if available in market.

(2.3.7) Convenience & locality

 Easy to find: Fortress stadium is considered to be heart of Lahore so to find Hyperstar is

not a big deal.
 Easy to go: Not an issue
 Convenient location: Ideal and expensive place of Lahore

(2.3.8) Cleanliness

 Hygienic practices: Yes every day for e.g. if the vegetable or fruit is rotten it is wasted
and every day Cantonment Board vehicle comes to collect the waste.
 Cleanliness: After every hour floor is cleaned and store is up to date with cleanliness.
 Quality food handling: as mentioned above every day quality is checked either the fruit
is rotten or clothes are not torn etc. Recently Hyperstar food is certified from HACCP.

 (2.3.9) High quality fresh food

 Healthy fresh food: Certification from HACCP do not let them compromise on quality
of food so it is fresh. Duration of Meats shelf life is three days and for confectionary is
four days live baking is done on the spot.
 Quality fresh food: Shelf life of food is less as compare to market so it is thrown away
after 3 to 4 days if not sold which happens less.

(2.3.10) Consistent stable low prices

 Competitive prices: from market Hyperstar prices are quiet less which are identified in
promotion also.
 Low, everyday prices: Due to heavy promotions and competitive edges.

 
 “LITERATURE REVIEW”

 (3.0) Literature Review

This research is supported through 16 articles and journals and written briefly by our own self.
The article consists of consumer behavior, Loyalty, Disloyalty, Satisfaction, Male emergent
group, Neuro science, Bargaining, discount and Re-patronage these all have supported the
research variables directly or indirectly. We didn’t use any reference of author in the articles we
did citation in the end .The articles are as follows.

Article # 1

Supermarket consumers and gender difference relating to their perceived importance levels of
store characteristics

Authors: Mortimer, Gary & Clarke, Peter

Summary:

The article by Mortimer, Gary & Clarke, and Peter is the key article of this research in which
gender difference relating to consumers perceived importance of characteristic in supermarket
are researched. This article identifies differences between male and female grocery shoppers,
there buying pattern, their attitudes and beliefs in retail context, and level of importance with
specific store characteristics and that specific store which is assigned is Hyperstar the mega retail
superstore store in Lahore.

The study takes place in the city of Australia (Brisbane) and they took equal sample of both male
and female and they also develop almost ten hypothesis based on the store characteristics with
the different level of importance for male and female. In article they believe that the traditional
male roles no longer exists as clearly defined social barriers to families roles. The merging of
traditional family roles and the acceptance of the society believes that men are now undertake
traditional female roles such as grocery shopping because of the societal shift men now able to
adopt more female traditional roles and grocery shopping is one of them.

They have ten different hypothesis as mentioned above based on the store characteristics they
have mention for e.g. Merchandise range, availability, quality, freshness, cleanliness, atmosphere
other service features are staffing competence, friendliness, speed of check out services, easy
parking, convenient location, low prices so in a nutshell “Four Ps” associated with the store
characteristics. Then different factors which affect buying pattern like age, income, education,
occupation and they believe that age can impact on enjoyment levels because younger men
appear disengaged and are generally unhappy when shopping, older men are either bored or
disinterested.

So keeping in view all the hypothesis and the factors affecting buying, store characteristics the
result demonstrate that male and female grocery shoppers considered important store
characteristics differently and all but one of the ten hypothesis is proven Male shoppers
considered Speed, Convenience & Efficiency to be the most important factors whereas in
contrast to male, female shoppers considered pricing cleanliness and quality.

As this research does not belong to Pakistan and our Pakistani society is female dominated
society where eighty five percent of shopping is done by our females. Males belong to working
class while most women’s are housewife as seen in our questionnaire also so female do shopping
and males earn money for it. Similar is the case in hyper star when we started asking questions to
customers in Hyperstar we came to know 80-85percent of customer was female some housewife
and few working class which is shown in the end result. The basic reasoning for conducting this
research was to investigate the gender difference affecting the store characteristic and what are
their perceptions about it. Some of the store characteristics which could affect or force consumer
to perceive were:

 Bi-Weekly promotion
 Trained staff
 Easy access to car park
 Well stocked shelves
 Convenient location
 Healthy fresh food
 Competitive prices

Article # 2

Attitudes toward coupon use and bargain hunting: an examination of differences by gender.

Authors: Hill, C. Jeanne Harmon, Susan K

Summary:

Coupon and bargaining is one of the favorite tools of females while they are shopping. They love
to bargain and to use maximum amount of coupons and the preferred shopping places of
women’s are either where they can get discount or the coupon in which they could get things or a
discount. When we talk about Pakistani women they are not far behind any other they want
discount and coupon in which anything free they can get. Why is it so because Pakistani
women’s are price sensitive?

Author continues that today male are more responsible for shopping they contribute more
towards the household’s things. As the research is conducted in U.S so the author says 54% of
male contribute towards their household chores whether they are singled, married or divorced.
The attitude towards the shopping of males is increased from past and many studies have been
revised and newly written on this new group of shoppers.

In upcoming studies in gender male are more specified because retailers are working today on
this group. The main objective of this study is to find out the gender difference and their attitude
towards the coupon use and bargain are based on age or some other group like male. While
shopping females enjoy which is inherently and males do not enjoy they just shop and the reason
that is hypothesized in this article that males bargain due to power and success.

Enjoyment while shopping in previous studies is discussed with a deep literature but in relation
with a coupon use what would be the enjoyment for both gender?

 Females: When a female gets a free coupon her level of enjoyment increases but this
enjoyment could be due to its family care she spent less and got more products.
 Male: For male level of enjoyment could be egoistic in terms of coupon use for him
enjoyment might be that he challenged the system or earned a price advantage.

This is the similar case of our research also which also predicts the same thing in use of coupon.
Sample size of 535 university student taken in two way sample process and conducted on a
university of USA. Twenty five statements were developed in which women more was inclined
that they are engage more in coupon use and bargaining hunting.

In the end different thoughts have been provoked in which the first one is that using coupons and
bargaining process is an economic reward process and females are more price sensitive .Few
males and females believes in U.S that coupons and bargaining is a embarrassing activity which
might hurt your social status. Different age groups suggest different things in it which again
proves gender and different groups in gender have different opinion .For e.g. 40+ people don’t
consider it an embarrassing situation and older people enjoy doing shopping.

Variations always occur some are happy some are not happy and convenient with this bargaining
or coupon process. Companies are trying to reduce this coupon thing they wanted to replace it
with incentive or discount according to them it’s not a healthy activity and more time consuming.

In Hyperstar similar to a coupon a gift card of 1000 rupees is given which is mentioned in our
variable but due to the less literacy rate of Pakistan people are not well familiar with it or they
don’t know the benefit they can get. It’s one of the best gift that you can give to any of your
friend or family member prior to it after doing a shopping of 10000 rupees you can win a trolley
with products of 10000 rupees but only though lucky draw. The procedure is as follows:

“Do shopping more than 10000 rupees and you will get a coupon fill it and put it in a luck box
At the date of lucky draw you might be able win a trolley with products of amount 10000
rupees’’

People in Hyperstar are quiet happy with the discounts, promotion, coupon and gift card because
this the only super store in Lahore which offer such kind of shopping characteristics running
throughout the year. In our research we also figure out that females are more willing for the
discount in terms of bargain and coupons while men’s are not that much interested in the
activities going around.

 
Article # 3

Why companies should make their customer happy the neural correlates customer loyalty

Authors: Hilke Plassmann, Peter Kenning and Dieter Ahlert

Summary:

Customer loyalty in one of the important factor that every superstore needs to focus on it
practically and as far as literature review is concerned also. In this article we study that how
customer builds affective relationships with brand or companies. As we are working on
superstore so we will go for supermarkets that how people build strong relationship with a
superstore .Different biological and neurological tests are applied on it relating to brain we can
say a hard and fast brain storming session study.

Loyalty definition described by Oliver that if your customer is satisfied with your store he/she
will definitely come in future to repurchase. A study was design to check and investigate the
difference between loyal and disloyal customer of a departmental store which would be
converted to super store as per our study. Total 300 sample size of customer was taken from the
club card of the departmental store in which 9 were females and 13 were males after several
screening process. Based on previous findings we came to know that the brands which were put
in the store loyal customer decision was changed due to emotionally attachment with it for e.g.
Puma etc

A technical term named fMRI is used which is related to neuro science which stands for
functional magnetic resonance imaging. fMRI is one of the lesser persistent method for studying
oxygenation levels of the brain the blood flow and used for brain mapping in it that at what
particular time it will buy or do a emotional or rational buying. In implication of this study it is
proven that the store should not only concentrate on their existing customer who comes only due
to promotion or any other technical things company or store should talk to their customer
personally also and communicate with them on monthly basis. The end result describes loyal
customers are loyal to store because due to some psychological drivers which might be
technology or any other thing.

Pakistani customers are also loyal but most of the customers are emotionally attached with the
brand or the company as mentioned above that a person might come to store due to his or her
favorite brand which forces him to come again and again. In Hyperstar there are multiple local
and Multinational brands which attract people to come for e.g. Puma, Muncherz noodles,
Lorealetc so same is the case with Hyperstar also that people come to buy that they are getting
their favorite brands from there. Next comes the psychological driver which makes Hyperstar
customer to be loyal due to its promotion, Cleanliness, easy access to car park and the
advertisement .Basic factor that the Hyperstar provides to its customer is convenience but the
level of communication is very low and slow. Customer only comes and talk to the desired
person only when he is not finding the thing but in this case also most of the customer hesitate to
talk they either buy a substitute or they leave the product it happens mostly in the case of
women’s so  communication should be done with customer on regular basis. In Hyperstar
women’s seems to be quiet loyal than men’s due to spending more time in store.

Article # 4

 Shoppers’ satisfaction levels are not the only key to store loyalty

  Authors: Mario J.Miranda,Laszlo konya, InkaHavrila

Summary:

The study conducted centralizing the grocery shoppers in order to discover the major factors that
influence satisfaction with their primary store and the factors that encourage them to keep on
supporting this store in spite of being presented with support to shop at another store. For study
purpose two models were estimated for research out of which one was predicting store
satisfaction while the other one was predicting the store loyalty when shoppers are presented
with a special purchase opportunity in an alternative store.

The research methodology is based on a structured questionnaire over a two-week period to adult
grocery shoppers across Melbourne, Australia, who exited retail stores of varying sizes excluding
Woolworth, Safeway and Coles stores. The sample consists of 376 male and 558 female
respondents and 558 of different occupations and average age of 45 years. Respondents were
carefully selected who regularly shop their groceries from the exited store.  Many factors are
realized in this study that what makes consumer to be loyal with the store. There could be a
reason that consumers are loyal to the store because of continuous repurchase.

This research is specifically written on that what are the important elements in retail firms like
marketing mix should be used to retain the customer. Study demonstrates that overall satisfaction
with a store did not influence customers to stay loyal to the store. The reason why a customer
stays loyal to its current store is that they are influenced by many things regular buyer program,
known staff and familiarity with shelf.

This study limitation was household size, employment status, and education background and
income level of the sample respondents. The studies indicates that increased in income, assured
employment, through greater education ability to process more information and slighter burden
in the family give the consumer get confidence to try some different stores that they may not
have visited before. Being a good income holder does not only work education plays a vital role
for shopping.

It’s recommended after research study that it is self-evident that shoppers will be exposing to
offer from competing retailers. Depending on the nature of the offer and quality of stock present
at the other store, a range of customers will outlook the offer and some among them might even
come to a decision to change their permanent loyalty to competition that may lead to destructive
effect on the retail firm’s profitability. The inconsistency of this loss to the retail firm is that
these escape customers may not have been dissatisfied with the service provide that were made
prior primary store but it’s refer just that the store did not protect them adequately from
switching to another! Whereas determined in this research study, there are the customers who
frequently resist the smart offers made by market competitors and stay loyal to their present
store.

Loyalty again after studying many articles is on the top priority .Store loyalty and store
satisfaction is also one of the significant parts that mega stores like Metro and hyperstar always
keep in their mind. Generally in Pakistan it is consider that when a customer is satisfied he/she
will be loyal to the store but this not always the case .In our study we found that few customers
were not loyal to the store but to the brands that they were offering for e.g. Puma, Kenwood,
Pioneer etc. Satisfaction is the major tool but things prove it should not be applied to the whole
store because the story sometimes gets different.

Article # 5

Consumer Shopping and Spending Across Retail Formats

 Authors: Edward J. Fox, Alan L. Montgomery, and Leonard M. Lodish

Summary:

Grocery shopping being the key factor of this research because the household shoppers are
mostly the grocery shoppers this study is a deep long study on the grocery shopping. In simple
words if we interpret the meaning that why the researcher is conducting the research is because
the small retail stores which are specifically for grocery shopping are facing the serious threat
from the big mega stores taking the e.g. of Wal-Mart which is a mass merchandiser and eaten up
the business of the small grocery merchandiser. For Pakistan we take the e.g. of Hyperstar which
is in retail context and more than plus 2000 grocery items are available in it eaten up the business
of grocery shoppers like best buy, HKB and etc. Researcher conducted a deep long experiential
study of household shopping and packaged foods (Gaining awareness in Pakistan also e.g. K &
Ns) speeded across retail formats and the formats are:

 Grocery Stores :In Pakistani context the stores could be best buy, Bismillah store etc
 Mass Merchandiser: e.g. Wal-Mart and in Pakistan Hyperstar, CSD
 Drug stores: Drug stores are the medical stores which in Pakistan are mostly know as
pharmacy shops e.g. Servaid, Noble, Zainab etc.

The basic reason to conduct this research is to find the difference between this retail formats and
what are the effects on shopping behavior of the consumer and how does he/she spends money
when the retailer has explored:

 Assortment: How well the retailer or mass merchandiser has assorted the products and is
consumer happy with the small grocery shopper or with Mass Merchandise. In our
 research we consider a variable named well stock shelf that are customers happy with the
well-organized or assorted shelf’s in Hyperstar and the maximum response was quiet
satisfied and some other told that in local grocery shopper store products are not that
much assorted as they should be. Satisfaction level of women for Hyperstar is more as
compared to men.
 Pricing: Mass merchandiser have good offered price or the grocery retailers or the
packaged foods that are available with drug store has the more effective pricing. We
consider variables named “Everyday low prices” which is the reflection of this shopping
format.

 Promotional Policies: Which store has the highest promotional polices in this the highest
voting is with Mass merchandiser as they have more than 2000 products to offer they
promote items on larger scale and customer becomes happy with the time being 
discount. In our study Hyperstar customer heavily focus on promotional items because
it’s the only store in the city which offers promotion throughout the year on grocery
items.
 Household demographics: Are female married or unmarried? Aged or not? Income and
occupation etc. We also considered it an important part of our research and we asked
consumers Sex, Age, occupation, Marital status.

This research is made possible by a new panel dataset collected by Information Resources Inc
and estimated consumer decisions through a hierarchical multivariate tobit model that

Where consumer like to shop

&

How much to spend or buy

This study is concluded upon that retailer marketing mix has more variation in shopping
behavior than the consumers travel time and in expenditure more variation is assorted products
rather than price and promotion .In drug store consumer is more concerned about the travel times
because it is related to convenience just get the product as fast as you could.

In Pakistan there is no such pharmacy which provides packaged food or the grocery there only
the Mass merchandiser got the drug store in it. Shoppers who shop more at Mass merchandiser
also go to other formats also so they do not alternate trips to the grocery store. Similarly people
at Hyperstar were window shoppers who just came for price comparison there to say that people
only buy or they can get best grocery there would be wrong consumer changes places and they
try the small grocers too.

Article # 6
 Shopping Experience Enjoyment: Impact on Customers’ Re-patronage Intentions, and
Gender Influence

 Authors: Cathy, Andrew, Grazyna, Gary and John

Summary:

Shopping experience today is gaining popularity in the view of researchers this study is also
related to consumer shopping experience and level of enjoyment influencing on the intention to
repurchase or Repatronage. There is always a question arises in the mind of the consumer

Q. Where to shop?

Q. Why to shop?

Consumer wanted to enjoy and have the lasting experience where ever he/she shops. It could be
the regional area where he/she lives or any other place which is on geographical boundaries. For
e.g. people of Multan, Bahawalpur, Sargodha and many other places  comes for shopping at
Hyperstar possibilities are their they don’t like shopping in there regional areas or they are not
convenient with those stores.

The three things which are highlighted in this article and at the core are:

 Enjoyment of shopping experience: Stores needs to create an image for the consumers
so they look better than its competitors and consumer gets a lasting experience while they
shop. Image is a basic thing which perceives the mind of the consumer while genders are
shopping. Hyperstar image is positive in mind so the consumer comes again and again
apart from all this once the image is created your consumer starts enjoying shopping.
Researcher believes that once the image or perception of the regional store is located in
the mind of the customer he/she gets emotionally attached with the store and spends more
time for shopping and will have a lasting experience. Store managers can work on the
strategies to improve the image of the store. In Pakistan Hyperstar or metro is the only
superstore which works on the image of the store.

 Customer’s intention to repurchase/Re-Patronage: Researcher correlates enjoyment

and excitement of consumer completely with the repurchase .If the consumer is happy
and excited while shopping in the store he/she will definitely come to repurchase in the
same store. Today why people come to Hyperstar again and again for shopping? The
reason because they enjoy shopping in the environment of Hyperstar which is one of the
leading superstore of Pakistan in retail context. If customer enjoys shopping the level of
excitement gets double. Pakistan youth only enjoys the environment of the store like
Hyperstar rather than concentrating more on shopping.

 Enjoyment of shopping in Gender differences: Researcher investigates after creating

the image and repurchases element with shopping experience that which gender is more
satisfied with the enjoyment of shopping and repurchase. After studying this deep long
 research again the matter stood on the gender which is getting complex for the
researchers also to investigate who are more satisfied and dissatisfied with the super
store.

The basic reason to conduct this research was to construct the shopping experience and its
relationship towards the consumer intention of repurchase in United Kingdom shopping districts.
Questionnaire and face to face interviews were conducted with the consumer. Study targeted
total 536 usable consumers across five countries of United Kingdom.

Four dimensions of shopping enjoyment are expressed above and 16 measures are developed.
The result of this study indicated that there is a positive relationship between the enjoyments of
shopping experience influencing on repurchase intentions. Hypothesis expressed that enjoyment
of shopping experience is reflected by four dimensions which were:

 Accessibility: How easy a customer can reach to the store .For e.g. According to
consumer who comes for shopping at Hyperstar said it is easy accessible located in the
heart of Lahore.

 Atmosphere: Physical attributes of the store which click in the mind of the consumer. In
Lahore Atmospheric stores are Mall of Lahore, Pot pori, Al-fateh and Hyperstar.

 Environment: Enjoyment has a direct relationship with environment of the store. Some
of the factors which cover the environment are security, cleanliness, good and opening
hours which are convenient. Our research covers all these variables which are necessary
for making environment of store.

 Service: Researcher stresses upon that people who are working on a store there attitude
should be positive and the most important thing their behavior should be normal. While
we were conducting research we heard that hyperstar staff is not friendly most of the time
In Pakistan mostly the service personnel are not friendly might be because they are not
well trained.

This study implicated much more for mangers how they can create an enjoyable shopping
experience for a consumer that influence on their repurchase decision. Gender playing important
role and again the gender difference came in the end result that men have a stronger intention of
repurchase with enjoyment as compared to females.

Pakistani men’s are always in rush and they spend less time for shopping so if they enjoy a
environment of a specific super store say for instance Hyperstar then most probably they will
come to repurchase that’s what our research also indicated us.

Article # 7
On Shelf Availability: An Examination of the Extent, the Causes, and the Efforts to Address
Retail Out-of-Stocks

 Authors: Daniel Corsten and Thomas Gruen

Summary:

Retail out of stock is previous concept but it is getting a good awareness which can lead to profit.
Fast moving consumer goods are the victim of this disease so called Retail out of stock OOS. In
this study several reasons are proposed why there is out of stock. Pakistani consumers are quiet
far away from this concept retail out of stock because they do not update their shelf on daily
basis special the local merchandiser or retailer

Over the past few years the big mega store like Metro, Makro and Hyperstar have started
working on this out of stock concept especially in fast moving consumer’s goods.

In our study the one variable which we choose is product availability in which customer’s
response was quiet good that they get things what they want and on shelf with assortment and
variety.

Study stresses that retailers are not paying attention to out of stock which lead to decrease in
profit of the store. Retailers can increase their revenue by 5% if they concentrate on this OOS
concept because market still got potential in it. Customer might get disloyal if he/she doesn’t find
products twice on shelf retailer and suppliers both need to work on this. Average out of stock rate
through whole world is 8.3 percent according to a research by coca cola. Europe 8.6 and USA
7.9 percent out of stock average where Pakistan retail expected potential rate is $42 billion.

Promotional items out of stock  is more as compared to normal products we faced the same case
in Hyperstar to because the promotional items mostly get out of stock if we talk about electronics
they were short if they come in promotion. Once your consumer knows about the promotion they
will just fall on things like Honey bee if we talk about Hyperstar especially.

There is no such method used in this study involving any special methodology but the interesting
questions and their answers are answered in it which is like:

 Consumer reaction at shelf out of stock

 What OOS cost a retailer
 Root causes of shelf out of stock
 Extent out of stock
 Remedies for OOS

Almost six items are proposed for OOS in this article and several conclusions also. Firstly and
OOS is a costly problem and it will sustain in future also. Secondly the duration of OOS is
threatening for the retailer to be disloyal all over the world OOS rate is increasing. It will be
difficult to say that OOS is an only problem of retailer but in fact it’s also the problem of third
party like supplier. In Hyperstar consumer face very less problem regarding out of stock and they
get things which they want only few of them faced problem in which things were in promotion.
Hyperstar doesn’t own any warehouses things just come and sell very few grocery items are
stocked.

Article # 7

Gender, store satisfaction and antecedents: a case study of a grocery store.

Authors: Helgesen and Nesset

Summary:

Researcher over the past few decades are focusing on the customer satisfaction level that

 How to satisfy a customer

o When to satisfy a customer
o Where to satisfy a customer

These few sentences are always roaming around a retailer what is the best possible way to satisfy
a customer .Again we are working on a super store and the article is related to the store and
various definition of customer satisfaction is given in different years.

This desired article will revolve around the consumer market, gender that how it differs while
shopping either male is more respondent or female is more respondent and gender difference is
one of the major topics of this report but in this article store satisfaction related to gender is on
priority. Lastly the study is conducted in Norway grocery store to check gender impact on store
satisfaction. Antecedent a term used in this article which means or we can say the
attributes/drivers before satisfaction.

The research is conducted in a Norwegian grocery store which is the part of the largest chains of
grocery stores. Sample size of 106 customer is taken in which 52 are males and 54 are females
from the age of 18-65 years old. The analysis was based on the 19 variables including
antecedents and t test also applied. Store satisfaction contains some elements or it reflects to
them such as positive word of mouth creates satisfaction, loyalty etc. Gender difference is also
influence on income, age and occupation which we have also asked in our questionnaire and it is
named as personal information of a customer to figure out the gender differences.

Concluding it that value proposition is the important factor for any manager and in the benefit of
the store. Cost is directly related to customer value so store cost should be cut and customer
should be provided a value which will increase the customer satisfaction level. Female’s
satisfaction level is more as compared to male but Antecedents, drivers or attributes are
independent of a gender.
Customer satisfaction level in Hyperstar is much higher it’s the only proper made superstore in
the metropolitan city of Lahore and people get almost all desired things that they are looking for
More than 2000 grocery products are placed inside the store and as far as gender difference is
concerned females are more satisfied which was seen while asking administer questions.
Attributes of Hyperstar like promotion, Gift card, hygienic food all the environment reflects the
satisfaction level of customer. As far as genders roles are concerned house wife or working class
shops more and they want value for what they buy.

Article # 9

Sharing of Home Responsibilities between Professionally Employed Women and Their

Husbands

Authors: Monica Biernat, Camille B. Wortman

Summary:

This research sharing home responsibility is conducted in United States where working couples
are on top priority. Some of the highlights on which this article revolves around are:

 What are the difficulties women faced while working

 Family get suffered
 Children care especially with above 6 years
 Welfare of the family
 Mental health gets suffered of family and mother both
 Equal status carriers

Sharing home responsibility when male is at home looking after home and vice versa. Women
labor force increased after 1998 in United States and they are facing much more difficulties then
before .Pakistani context will be different because we have less than 50% of females in working
class.

The basic theme behind the study is that it’s getting difficult to meet the job and family pressures
get understood. When both partners are in working class how can they manage their child care if
one of the partners is working for say female works then child’s attention can get diverted so
how to take care of this thing researcher says none of the study is done on child care.

College studies has sophisticated effect on the females so they wanted that their husband should
be more educated rather than having a status only so education and income plays a vital role in
the carrier of a women .In this research author indicates now it is needed to find that the men
work on job gives less time to children and this case is opposite in female case. The research is
quiet complicated and lengthy in which role conflict, stress and women managing children with
above 6 years are targeted.
Sample size of 139 couples was taken in which both agreed to participate subsample include 68
university professor and 71 businesswomen. This research took almost a year to be completed
because wife was asked 4 structured interviews and two self-report surveys were done with
husband for a whole year. Almost 8 questions were asked from husband and wife about the child
care involvement with the help of profile analysis.

Conclusion ends on this that study proves that women are more complicated in terms of spouse
and children as compared to men in sharing equal responsibilities. The drawback of this study
might be that this study does not cover the couples who both are earning in general population.
Traditional values also effects the sharing responsibility of home in which females are more
involved both male and female our trying to get familiar with the social changes that are
becoming their daily need. So children are definitely involved when we study couples or sharing
their responsibilities.

Store involvement in this article was not a priority, child involvement while the couples work
was more in it. Pakistan no doubt is a free state but again working women’s are very less so the
concept of sharing home responsibility between husband and wife finishes because maximum
number of women’s are house wife and they take care of the home chores.

In case if both couples are working then again female involvement is more in house she comes
home and takes care of children and the house too. Pakistani women attitude towards the home is
positive men rely more on women to get their home chores get done. A woman goes for
shopping more while we were doing our survey in Hyperstar we notice maximum no of women’s
buying grocery for their home.

Article # 10

The female fashion consumer behavior (From the perspective of the shop Fever in
Gothenburg)

Authors: Julia Holmberg Rebecca Ohnfeldt

Summary:

Fashion is one of the fast moving processes which changes almost daily similarly this research is
about that how a small independent retailer named as Fever should affect the female consumers.
In March 1998 Fever started its operations as an independent retailer in Gothenburg, Sweden
with one shop and one web shop. The clothes made sold by fever were found at the middle of
fashion pyramid means the clothes which were sold they were in so fast process that sold clothes
get in the middle of fashion when new are coming in. In Hyperstar clothes are not that much
prominent as they should there are two to three sections of clothes in which females and males
clothes both are different. Consumers at Hyperstar are not that much happy with clothes there
because they are expensive in terms of quality.
The target market of Fever is the men and women who are 20 to 40 years old. Large clothing
chains like H&M, Lindex and Kappahl are market leaders at that time when research is
conducted so due to this the fever store was in a problematic situation. Now days we can easily
buy a high fashion at a lower price from fever and this is how customer shows a response
towards Fever retail.

This retail is facing the difficulty in reaching the female target group the male customers are
loyal to the retail. The main purpose of the study is to investigate that why female customers are
not able to understand the Fevers clothes shopping but in Hyperstar you can get convenience
trendy clothes not specialized clothes like fancy or bridal wear etc so our study with this relation
is different.

The theories and models that constitute the theoretical framework include market segmentation,
the Marketing Mix, consumer behavior and the female consumer behavior. The market
segmentation they have segmented the market on the bases of geographic (according to region),
demographic, psychographic and behavioral. In marketing mix they will focus on the 4ps that are
product, price, place and promotion.

The scientific research approach which they have used is hypothetical deduction in which they
will first derive the hypothesis and then tested empirically and in this the hypothesis is how the
female consumer behavior affects the shop Fever.

The method which they have used is the combination of two quantitative surveys of female
consumer behavior and an interview to obtain more knowledge about the female behavior. In the
beginning the research is exploratory because the knowledge and understanding of the problem
area is needed for the rest of the thesis. And this is also descriptive because this study is based on
primary data that seeks information about specific situations.

They techniques which they have used for the data collection involved both interviews and
surveys which is quiet similar to our research. They use two types of interview one they
conducted in city and outside Fever and other are the less structured interview.

The conclusion shows that the female consumer behavior effect the Fever is both positive and
negative.Positive aspects are in such a way that women considered that shopping is a joyful
activity. Several women had heard about Fever from the friends this means Fever has a good
reputation which means word of mouth counts for retailer. Fevers unique clothes help them to
make their strong identity which could be a brand image but in Hyperstar it will not be the same
situation for e.g. if a person bought puma shoes from Hyperstar then friends or family after
watching might say bought from an outlet specifically for puma. Negativeaspects are that
women’s were preferred strong chain for shopping which sell fast fashion at low price. And the
major problem was to get women to purchase the clothes at their shop.

This research is little bit different from Hyperstar no doubt the fashion changes in it but
consumer are buying on their convenience and some crazy people come twice a month to check
promotion on clothes.