Retail revolution is taking place in Big Cities of India and everybody is gung ho about it…According to me it’s a step towards consumerism in India. Every time i visit any of Supermarket like Big Bazaar or HyperCity, I end up buying more and shop for almost double the amount then required…Every week i visit Supermarket with the list of items required & before entering the Supermarket i promise myself that i will not buy any item/product outside the list and i will purchase only required quantity. Once i finish shopping, i realize again i end up buying more..Its better to avoid Avoid Shopping at Supermarkets. You must be thinking, is it some super natural power responsible behind this behavior..No, let me admit i am only solely responsible & will tell u why…
1st we need to understand why people prefer Supermarket over next door small retailer…Reason is very simple, u get lot of variety under 1 roof & u can find almost all household items at one place…Small retailers or Store can’t stock that much…Today if I go to small store, in all probability i will not find all products required my me & i need to visit 2-3 small stores to purchase all items…Biggest problem in big cities is that people don’t have time, so as i. Secondly I also don’t have patience to search for products at various stores…I myself has experienced the same. Few weeks back I decided to visit, Small store next door with list of 12 items..He had only 8 out of 12 then i moved to next store & got another 3 but for Sliced Olives, i ended up wasting another 50 mins…In total i spent 2 Hr 30 Mins in this exercise…If I would have visited Big Bazaar then my complete shopping would have been completed in 40 Mins.
Now coming u must be wondering why we end up paying more at supermarket, Answer is Biggest factor which contribute to high spend in Supermarkets is they don’t stock small SKU’s (Stock keeping Units) or Small packing’s of product… e.g. if u r planning to buy Cummins seed & ur monthly consumption is 50g but in Supermarkets, the lowest packing will be of 250g so u end up buying 5 times ur requirement…Same goes for almost all products..Secondly, Super Markets are very smart they will provide offers by bundling Big Packing’s e.g. You are planning to buy 500ml Cold Drink but discount offer is that with Two 500ml bottles, 1 is free so in all probability u end up buying 3 Bottles but ur requirement was only 1. Basically the objective is to alter consumption pattern…From customer perspective, it means either increased wastage or high consumption & both are not good….
Second factor is impulse buying…In FMCG sector, some products are referred as impulse buying products. Few e.g. Kids Merchandize or Food items, Chocolates or aspirational products like Ferrero Rocher etc. Another case may be, u r planning to buy Red Label Tea but u end up buying Red label Premium which cost 40-50 Rs more than regular pack…So impulse buying not necessarily mean buying xtra product but it can also mean that u end up buying premium version of product required by u which might be 20-30% costly then regular one…
Last but not the least Supermarkets spend lot of time and energy in product placement…In fact many Big retailers hire specialists in this field…The products with high probability of sale & Impulse buying are being placed at your eye level so that they are directly visible to u…Products targeted to kids are placed at their eye level that is why u find all chocolates, Candy etc at 3-4 feet height. There is science behind this and objective is to generate maximum sale.
In a nutshell, Shopping at Super Market will put a big hole in ur pocket and quite expensive affair..It’s better to identify small store near to ur house, which can fulfill ur monthly household grocery requirements & stock products of ur choice…Infact in order to compete with Big retailers these small stores offer some fixed discount on purchase e.g. one of store near my house give flat 2% discount on total bill…Most important is that u buy only what u need from small stores….Another advantage is, these small stores accept Sodexho coupons for full purchase irrespective of Food or Non Food items whereas all Supermarkets have stopped accepting Sodexho…Last but not least you control wastage by not buying Xtra…So next time before entering supermarket think twice.
Copyright © 2011-2012 Nitin Bhatia. All Rights Reserved.
Good idea to maintain your purchases within budget but I would like to add that usage of debit/credit cards instead of cash payments also instigate to purchase more than requirement.
Ravi Delhi
The supermalls offer discounts only on few items and highlight it as if they are offering discounts on all the items. Generally the customers get attracted to these discounts and end up purchasing more items than required.
Nice article sir