the shopkeeper !!

As I entered in the shop. Mr Ramesh patel owner of “riddhi siddhi” general stores in vashi sector 16 gave a blank look and asked “ boliye madam kya chahiye”.. dat was quite boring expression but then

Wen I told him about the assignment that was given  to us from college to know how he manages his shop.. a great smile appeared on his face and he offered me a chair to sit. Then he told me that I was the only person who had asked him about the management and working of his shop in his last 34 years… I started off with the questionnaire I had made to ask him so the  conversation carried on with the following question and answer. I started wid basic questions such as, how does the final goods come in your hand???Mr Patel ( explaining with a flowchart)the finished goods are dispatched from the company that is the manufacturer then it goes to the dealer and the dealer distributes it to the wholesaler and the retailer, we have a retail shop here we don’t sell goods in wholesale, who pays the transportation costs of goods?.Mr Patel answers “ the transportation costs is paid by the company. That’s the only benefit we have in this business”. when  asked about the discounts that they get on the product he answered that only 15 to 20% discounts are offered to them which is not enough to maintain the shop in the sense of infrastructure and the payments of the other workers in the shop. The profit margin is very less but the customers think that they get great amount of discounts and the shopkeepers are looting them  and saving large amount of profits which if practically calculated and looked upon is not the fact. But still to maintain  good relations with the customers they have to offer some amount of discount to them just for the goodwill purpose. When asked about the most popular product it was undoubtedly ‘maggi products’. Maggi products are the most popular and largely sold most of the profit is earned from these products. Another  would be shampoo sachets and other such small daily use items and mostly the fast food products. When I asked Mr. Patel that how he chooses which items are to be sold in his shop he answers  with a weird expression on his face saying ‘’ it all depends on the advertising of the product, more attractive the advertisement more is the demand so accordingly we choose the items’’ this is when I realized that even a small retailer is indirectly related to media. The quality of the goods depend upon the demand and the price  ( which we have learned in our basic economics)demand and supply goes hand in hand.. Mr. patel also added that sometimes customers come up with great arrogance and taunt me on being a gujrati and  looting them. this is very insulting but we have to take it with a smile on our face just to maintain the relation with the customers. At the end mr patel  also said that  food bazaar. Hypercity and such food markets have emerged because of which we are loosing customers and facing great losses , nowadays people have become brand conscious and think that buying from a mall will prove them elite and create a standard in the society but it’s the same material that we sell in our shops.great amount of discounts are offered there so it’s a major loss for us now to run our shops and manage it in the limited amount of profit.  After this conversation even my set of mind towards the retailers was changes as I personally got to know how they manage their shop and industrialization has affected the traditional ways of buying and selling of goods…