Retail

Retail

The Indian retail market has been ranked the second most attractive emerging market for investment after Vietnam. The Indian retail industry is estimated to be worth Rs 13-14 lakh crore in FY 2008 . The Indian retail sector is highly fragmented in nature. The penetration of Organised Retail in the Indian market is much below the levels in other countries. Organised/Modern retailing refers to trading activities undertaken by licensed retailers and includes formats such as hypermarkets and supermarkets, and retail chains.

Organised Retail, valued at Rs 96,500 crore in 2008, accounts for around 5% of the total retail market. Organised Retail has been growing at an impressive rate of 35% to 40% Y-O-Y in the last few years compared to 9-10% growth in the overall retail industry.

Traditional/unorganised retailing contributes to about 95% of total retail revenues. Traditional/unorganised retailing which involves the local kirana shops, paan /beedi shops, hand cart and pavement vendors, etc. continues to be the backbone of the Indian retail industry. India has one of the highest densities of shops per population with 1.5 crore small retail outlets in India (14 shops per 1,000 people).

The Organised Retail market stood at Rs.96,500 crore in 2008. The industry has grown at a CAGR of 36% between 2004 and 2008. This growth was mainly driven by changing lifestyles, rising disposable incomes, favourable demographics, and easy credit availability, etc.

Some Skill Gaps as Identified by Industry:

• Inadequate understanding of cross functional activities such as logistics, in store marketing and merchandising is limited
• Man management skills to keep the employees motivated in the demanding work environment
• Ability to adapt quickly to the changing customer/market trends
• Insufficient knowledge of completion both in general and specifically local to the catchment area of the store
• Inadequate knowledge of processing of transactions and managing cash
• Inadequate knowledge of software related to transaction processing
• Inadequate soft skills -ability to interact with customers in the presence of a long queue
• Inadequate product specific knowledge, especially at the entry level
• Inadequate understanding of sales promotion, marketing and other schemes
• Inadequate communication skills and interpersonal skills is the major concern as it is relatively easier to bridge gaps in functional skills
• Inadequate skills to customise the merchandising plan to varying requirements of individual stores
• Insufficient soft skills to liaison with the stores and purchase departments
• Inadequate negotiation skills
• Shortage of skilled people especially at the manager levels
• Soft skills required for co-ordinating with other departments

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