Different types of retail business establishments as follows:
1. Based on merchandise offered
2. Based on ownership
1. Based on merchandise offered
(a) Convenience stores: These are smallsized stores located in residential areas. They are open for long hours and offer a limited line of convenience products like eggs, bread, milk, vegetables, etc.
(b) Supermarkets: A supermarket is a self-service shop offering a wide variety of food and household products, organised into aisles.
(c) Hypermarkets: A hypermarket is a retail store that combines a departmental store and a grocery supermarket. Often a very large establishment, hypermarkets offer a wide variety of products, such as appliances, clothing and groceries.
(d) Specialty stores: Consumer outlets, such as furniture, electronics, sports, appliances, jewellery stores, that offer unique, often individualised products or a large amount of products within a particular grouping of consumer goods are considered to be specialty stores.
(e) Departmental stores: A departmental store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different product categories known as ‘departments’ . Departments are made as per different types of goods to be sold. It requires a lot of capital to maintain different departments and a huge stock of goods. The profit or loss is calculated on the entire stock. It is a combination of decentralised buying and centralised selling. They also establish restaurants inside these stores. They provide home delivery services.
(f) Catalogue showrooms: Catalogue retailers usually specialise in hard goods (houseware, jewellery, consumer electronics, etc).
In a catalogue showroom (store), the customers view products from printed or online catalogues in the store and fill out an order form. This order is then brought to the sales counter, where an associate arranges to retrieve the items from the warehouse. Thus, the catalogue serves to act as an interface between the product and the customer.
(g) Discount store: In this store products sell at a discounted price, which is less than the actual price of the products.
(h) Shopping mall: A shopping mall is a modern term for a form of shopping center, in which one or more buildings form a complex of shops representing merchandisers with interconnecting walkways that enable customers to walk from unit to unit.
(i) General store: General store is a retail store in a small town or rural community that carries a wide variety of goods, including groceries. These stores often sell staple food items, such as milk and bread, and various household goods, such as hardware and electrical supplies.
(j) Warehouse store: A warehouse store is a food and grocery retailer that operates stores geared towards offering deeper discounted prices than a traditional supermarket. Warehouse clubs sometimes charge a membership fee also.
(k) Variety store: A variety store is a retail store that sells a wide range of inexpensive household goods.
2. Based on Ownership
(a) Independent retailer: An independent retailer is a small business, owned and operated by an individual versus a corporation. An independent retailer has direct contact with customers. For example, local Baniya or Kirana store, and Paanwala. He or she decides the retail strategy based on store location and product mix.
(b) Corporate retail chain: A retail chain is one of a group of stores engaged in the same kind of business in different locations and under the same ownership and management. Chain stores in malls or shopping centers are always looking to improve their position and strengthen their brand identity in the marketplace . For example, Reliance, Bata, Arrow, Louis Philippe, Food World, etc.
(c) Franchising: Franchising is an arrangement where one party (the franchiser) grants another party (the franchisee) the right to use its trademark or tradename as well as certain business systems and processes, to produce and market a good or service according to certain specifications. For example, Mc Donald’s, Pizza Hut, Van Heusen, etc.
(d) Consumer cooperatives: Consumers’ cooperatives are enterprises owned and managed by consumers which aim at fulfilling the needs and aspirations of their members. Consumers’ cooperatives often take the form of retail outlets owned and operated by their consumers. The customers or consumers of the goods and/or services the cooperative provides are often also the individuals who have provided the capital required to launch or purchase that enterprise. For example, Apna Bazaars in Mumbai, etc.
