The waging Supermarket trend

Remember the good old Kirana store next to your house? One would practically order everything from the store that is run by a single ‘Bania’ based on trust, relationship and goodwill; the families would cherish a close bonding with these small outlets where even books of credit were maintained for the monthly purchases. Times are changing now and the traditional Kirana stores are slowly becoming extinct, thanks to the latest fad in the Country called Supermarkets.

The changeover that was mostly derived from the West has been highly influenced by the idea of American stores like Walmart, Best Buy and Target. We now have the Big Bazaars, the Hyper City and the Spencer’s Retail that are India’s answer to the developing lifestyle that has seen a paradigm shift since the past decade.

Spread out in a vast area at select places in the City where there would be a potential ‘traffic’, these departmental stores boast of all the brands and goods under one single roof. Both the ‘desi’ and the foreign commodities sit next to each other nicely under various categories done up for different domestic items required by households. The options are plenty and the choices are now limitless for an average working class Indian who makes enough money to afford these brands, thanks to the multi-national investment feeding into the economy’s job market.

The large super markets started picking up pace since the mid-nineties, where the concept of a ‘large’ store was just coming into vogue in the country. Massive resistance was felt initially, thanks to the fear of the unknown; people who were more comfortable with their Kirana shops and were curious about the ‘costliness’ of these fancy outlets would not readily step in to make purchases. However, turn of events made a tremendous shift when the select supermarket players started branding themselves, slowly penetrating the domain that was singly catered to by the small players. The marketing done extensively worked the next few years, drawing the crowd with variety of commodities on display, fancy discounts that were initially unheard of and ‘Buy one, get one’ offers running on the most important grocery items – a strategy that was well decided to get the attention of the buyer’s market.

The trend which started that way picked up has grown leaps and bounds through the years till date. Now, almost everybody wants to shop for monthly groceries in a supermarket. This is mainly prevalent in the most urban areas where the employment sectors are heavily housed. Malls, supermarkets and multiplexes now define life for this working class crowd that sees great comfort in walking into an air conditioned superstore and swiping the card to make the purchases and call it a day. There are no long lists tallied with, no hassles with computing the final cost manually and most importantly – no wastage of time or error with the aid of computerized billing over the counter.

Interestingly the upsurge in the supermarket trend was seen more in between the years 2000 and 2009, the time that peaked in terms of BPO s and IT jobs coming into the Country in the lavish foreign companies spread out in the SEZ’s. This is a standing testimonial to the fact that the increased earning spending power of an average middle class employee has boosted the morale to indeed hit the level up. The supermarkets now cater to approximately 80 percent of the crowd in a metropolitan, flaunting some loyal customers who even carry their respective ‘store’ card, welcoming the tradition of the West in retailing.

The most important question is about the fate of those good old Kirana stores. While the majority of the crowd still continue to shop at the big giants, there is a new section emerging that has identified the need to cut down on the ‘unrequired’ and ‘unforeseen’ costs thanks to the sinking job market in the present times. People are now turning their heads a wee bit towards these tiny shops who have conveniently upgraded themselves with technology to enable efficient billing. The prices are also at the actuals, unlike the grand theatrics of the superstores that hide taxes somewhere which suddenly pop out at the end of the shopping ordeal.

However, the mega supermarket craze continues. This fad is expected to continue till there is a mental vexation derived out of the vain spending habits of a typical urban crusader in the economy.