BUSINESS ACCESS TO THE RETAILERS: A STUDY ON THE CUSTOMER

PERFORMANCE TOWARDS SELECTING THE RETAIL OUTLETS.

Dr.R.THANGA PRASHATH M.B.A.,M.Phil.,Ph.D.,

Assistant Professor in Management,
Bharath Institute of Management,
Thanjavur-613005.

INTRODUCTION
An important aspect of the current business economic scenario in India is the emergence of
organized multiple-brand retail. There has been considerable growth in organized retailing
business in recent years and it is poised for much faster growth in the future. Major industrial
houses have entered this area and have announced very ambitious future expansion plans.
Transnational corporations are also seeking to come to India and set up retail chains in
collaboration with big Indian companies. In the context of divergent views on the impact of
unorganized retail, it is essential that an in-depth analytical study on the possible effects in retail
sector in India. The unorganized sector is playing a vital role in developing business economics
of India.
Unorganized store retailing has been one of the easiest ways to generate self-employment, as it
requires limited investment in land, capital and labour. It is generally family run business with
lack of standardization and the retailers who are running this store are lacking education,
experience and exposure.

LITERATURE REVIEW
Empirical Studies on Retail Store loyalty

Dick and Basu (1994) argued that consumer loyalty is primarily determined by the strength of
the relationship between an individuals repeat patronage and their relative attitude towards the
store. Based on these two factors, repeat patronage and relative attitude, the authors proposed
four conditions relevant to loyalty: loyalty, latent loyalty, spurious loyalty and no loyalty. Knoxs
(1998) diamond of loyalty classifies consumers as either loyals, habituals, variety seekers
and switchers, based on the size of the market and their degree of involvement. Rowley (2005)
expanded on Dick and Basus four category model of loyalty, combining their model with the
concepts behind Knoxs Diamond of Loyalty. Rowley (2005) proposed that the loyal category
from Dick and Basus model should be further divided to allow for loyalty by inertia versus
positive loyalty.
Empirical Studies on Service quality, Customer satisfaction and store loyalty
The relationship between customer satisfaction and service quality has received a good deal of
attention in the literature (cf. Bolton and Drew, 1994). However, the vast majority of articles
attempting to examine this interrelationship have been of a non-empirical nature (Iacobucci et
al., 1995). (Anderson and Fornell ,1994) indicate that the literature is not very clear about the
distinction between quality and satisfaction. (Rust and Oliver ,1994) suggest that customer
satisfaction or dissatisfaction a ``cognitive or affective reaction'' emerges as a response to a
single or prolonged set of service encounters. Satisfaction is a ``post consumption'' experience
which compares perceived quality with expected quality, whereas service quality refers to a
global evaluation of a firm's service delivery system (Anderson and Fornell, 1994).

(Parasuraman et al., 1985). Using experimental design and qualitative techniques, in one of the
few empirical studies of this relationship,( Iacobucci et al.,1995) conclude that the key difference
between service quality and customer satisfaction is that quality relates to managerial delivery of
the service while satisfaction reflects customers' experiences with that service. They argue that
quality improvements that are not based on customer needs will not lead to improved customer
satisfaction.
Empirical Studies on Seller Buyer Relationship
Most definitions of relationship marketing stress the existence of advantages for both parties in a
relationship (e.g., Grnroos 1990). This assumption that a relationship takes two implies that
both the seller and the buyer should be inclined to engage in a mutual relationship. As repeat
business provides sellers with benefits such as better financial results, increased market
knowledge, more stable market conditions, increased sales opportunities, and more flexible
approaches of the market (Reichheld and Sasser 1990), the researchers expect most sellers to be
willing to build strong customer relationships. Therefore, it is not surprising that the value of
relationship marketing has mainly been viewed from a sellers perspective to the neglect of the
buyers perspective (Sheth and Parvatiyar 1995). Nevertheless, several academics recognize the
importance of taking a buyer perspective in investigating relationships (Gruen,1995). For
example, Barnes (1997) postulated that no relationship will exist unless the buyer feels that one
exists. The assumption that a relationship can be formed with any buyer often leads sellers to
waste valuable resources, simply because the buyer does not want a relationship.

Seller-Buyer Relationship
According to Kotler et al (2002) interactive marketing means that the perceived service quality
depends heavily on the quality of the buyer-seller interaction. While grocery retailing involves
tangible product marketing to a large extent, it also has significant portion of service aspects.
Customers buy products from retailers; retailers have employees who interact with customers in
the shopping and buying process. Parasuman, Zeithaml and Berrys (1988) SERVQUAL model
lists reliability, competence, communication, courtesy, and responsiveness which all relate to
employees in a marketing organisation.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Structural Equation Modeling
The main study used Structural Equation Modeling because of two advantages: (1) Estimation
of Multiple and Interrelated Dependence Relationships, and (2) The Ability to Represent
Unobserved Concepts in These Relationships and Account for Measurement Error in the
Estimation Process (Hair et al., 1998).Therefore simultaneously estimated multiple regressions;
the direct and indirect effects were identified (Tate, 1998).However, a series of separate multiple
regressions had to be established based on theory, prior experience, and the research objectives
to distinguish which independent variables predict each dependent variable (Hair et al., 1998).In
addition, because SEM considers a measurement error, the reliability of the predictor variable
was improved. AMOS 7.0 (Arbuckle and Wothke, 2006), a computer program for formulating,
fitting and testing Structural Equation Models (SEM) to observed data was used for SEM and the
data preparation was conducted with SPSS 13.0.

Linear Structural Equation Models (SEMs) are widely used in sociology, econometrics,
management, biology, and other sciences. A SEM (without free parameters) has two parts: a
probability distribution (in the Normal case specified by a set of linear structural equations and a
covariance matrix among the error or disturbance terms), and an associated path diagram
corresponding to the causal relations among variables specified by the structural equations and
the correlations among the error terms. It is often thought that the path diagram is nothing more
than a heuristic device for illustrating the assumptions of the model. However, in this research,
the researcher will show how path diagrams can be used to solve a number of important
problems in structural equation modeling.
Linear regression is one of the most popular statistical techniques used by researchers. Despite
its popularity, interpretation of the regression coefficients of any but the simplest models is
sometimes difficult. This article explains how to interpret the coefficients of continuous and
categorical variables. Although the example used here is a linear regression model with two
predictor variables, the same approach can be applied when interpreting coefficients from any
regression model without interactions, including logistic and proportional hazards models.
Output of Linear Regression Analysis
SPSS will generate quite a few tables of output for a linear regression. In this section, we show
you only the three main tables required to understand your results from the linear regression
procedure, assuming that no assumptions have been violated. A complete explanation of the
output you have to interpret when checking your data for the six assumptions required to carry
out linear regression is provided in our enhanced guide here. This includes relevant scatter plots,
histogram (with superimposed normal curve) and Normal P-P Plot, and case wise diagnostics
and Durbin-Watson statistic tables.

Regression model
In simple linear regression, the model used to describe the relationship between a single
dependent variable y and a single independent variable x is y = a0 + a1x + k. a0and a1 are
referred to as the model parameters, and is a probabilistic error term that accounts for the
variability in y that cannot be explained by the linear relationship with x. If the error term were
not present, the model would be deterministic; in that case, knowledge of the value of x would be
sufficient to determine the value of y.
Below, the researcher has focus on the results for the linear regression analysis only.

LINEAR REGRESSION ANALYSIS

SPSS Output:
Model Summary

Model

R Square

Adjusted R Square

Std. Error of the

Estimate

.745

.555

.551

4.31325

a. Predictors: (Constant), Customer Loyalty, Products, After Sales Services, Sell Buyer Relationship, Price, Store
Preference, Stores Physical Facilities.

The first table of interest is the modal summary table. This table provides the R and R 2 value. The
R value is 0.745, which represents the simple correlation, It indicates a high degree of correlation
.The R2 value indicates how much of the dependent variable, (Customer Satisfaction) can be
explained by the independent variable, (Customer Loyalty, Products, After Sales Services, SellerBuyer Relationship, Price, Store Preferences, Store Physical Facilities). In this case 55% is not
affected much by the numbers of independent variables in the model.

ANOVAa
Model
1

Sum of Squares

df

Mean Square

Regression

6.692

2.385

Residual

4.447

792

18.604

Total

1.139

799

Sig.
.000b

40.957

a. Dependent Variable: Customer Satisfaction

b. Predictors: (Constant), Customer Loyalty, Products, After Sales Services, Sell Buyer Relationship, Price, Store
Preference, Stores Physical Facilities

The next table is the ANOVA table .This table indicates that the regression model predicts the
outcome variable significantly well. This indicates the statically significance of the regression
model that was applied here P<0.0005, which is less than 0.05,and indicates that, overall ,the
modal applied can statistically predict the outcome variable.
The ANOVA table indicates that the R2 value is statistically distinct from zero, with an f-value of
40.957(df=792)that is accompanied by a P value of less than .001.
Coefficientsa
Model

Unstandardized Coefficients

Standardized

Sig.

Coefficients
B
(Constant)

Std. Error
5.266

.831

Store Preference

.010

.023

Products

.213

Stores Physical Facilities

Beta
6.335

.000

.015

.434

.664

.038

.202

5.612

.000

.091

.034

.096

2.729

.006

-.022

.033

-.023

-.667

.505

After Sales Services

.094

.039

.075

2.439

.015

Seller Buyer Relationship

.260

.027

.321

9.794

.000

Customer Loyalty

.264

.031

.261

8.639

.000

Price

a. Dependent Variable: Customer Satisfaction

The table above, Coefficients, provides us with information on each predictor variable.

Store Preference (0.664)

It is best to average the Store Preferences (b=.010) is not significant (P=0.664), but only just so,
and this indicate the percentage of the dimension is not an important factor for customer
satisfaction toward selecting the retail outlet.
Products (.000)
Next the effects of products (b=.213,p=.000) is significant and this indicate the percentages of
the dimension is important factor for customer satisfaction toward selecting the retail outlet.
Stores Physical Facilities (.006)
To average the Store Physical Facilities dimension (b=.091) is not significant (p=.006),but only
just so, and this indicate the percentage of the dimension is little bit important factor for
customer satisfaction toward selecting the retail outlet.
Price (.505)
Next the effect of price (b= -.022) is not significant (p=.505),but only just so and the coefficient
in negative which would indicate that the customers are not giving preference to price while
selecting the retail outlet .
After Sales Services (.015)
After Sales Services dimension (b=.094) is not significant (p=.015), but only just so and this
indicate the percentage of the dimension is just important factor for customer satisfaction
towards selecting the retail outlet.
Seller Buyer Relationship (.000)
Next the effect of seller buyer relation (b=.260),(p=.000) is significant and its coefficient is
negative indicating that the proportion customers satisfaction is related to the seller buyer

relationship this is the most important factor for customer satisfaction towards selecting the
retail outlet.
Customer Loyalty (.000)
Finally the percentage of the customers full identification (b=.264), (p=.000) is significant and
this indicate the percentage of the dimension customer loyalty is greater and important to the
customer while associated with shop.

Conclusion
As an importance component of the service sector grocery retailing contributes a wider
understanding of the broader internationalisation process. According to the results retailers
should make attempts to increase the reliability of service they should be more responsive to

Grocery shopper needs and display a caring attitude towards consumers. Because the consumer
is going to drive the market and retailers have to equip themselves to the Consumer needs.
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