Congested parking lots, out-of-stock merchandise, interminable checkout lines, indifferent sales help or no help at all—once these were facts of life that retail customers reluctantly tolerated. Now customers enjoy more retail alternatives than ever before, from one-stop superstores to the Internet. Driven by time pressures, they value quick-and-easy shopping excursions. They expect retailers to meet their needs, not the other way around. The retailer that spares its customers hassles and delays wins their business and outperforms its old-fashioned competitors. From prepurchase through postpurchase, customers want convenience.
Few dispute the importance of convenience.1 Many retailers proudly declare their commitment to customer convenience. Yet how many managers have defined convenience from the customer’s point of view? How many have systematically crafted a convenience strategy? Instead, managers use “convenience” as a catchall term which always includes location and may include other features such as product assortment, knowledge of sales associates, speed of checkout, hours, service levels, store layout, and ample parking. Managers rarely consider the relationships among these features.
While convenience remains ill-defined among retailers, industry studies provide some insight into how consumers define convenience. Discount Store News conducted focus groups in which customers were asked, “What makes a store more convenient?” Respondents cited one-stop shopping, store directories, well laid-out and clearly-marked aisles, wider aisles, consistent in-stocks, clearly... To read the complete article, login or sign-up using the form below.
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