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Basics of Marketing - Kotler Philip

Variety of concentration of shops

VARIETY OF CONCENTRATION OF SHOPS . The last principle of classification of retail trading establishments is the number of stores the consumer faces, with one or several groups. Today, most stores are concentrated in shopping areas because of the local authorities' orders to zoning the areas of activity, and because of the desire to create a consumer more opportunities to make all the necessary purchases "for one visit." Concentrated in one place stores solve the same problem as supermarkets and department stores, saving time and effort of the consumer when searching for the goods necessary to him. There are concentrations of four main types, the central business district, the regional shopping center, the district shopping center and the shopping center of the microdistrict.

Central business district. The main form of grouping of retail stores until the early 1950s was their concentration in the central business districts. In each large and not very large city there was a central business district, where department stores, specialized shops, banks and main cinemas were located. Near this area, as well as closer to the outskirts, there were smaller business districts. Then in the 1950s, the outflow of population to the suburbs began. Moved to the suburbs began to buy less in the central business district, so as not to drive over crowded streets, not to pay for expensive parking and not to worsen the ecological situation in the city center. The central business districts declined and this caused the owner of the shops located there to open branches of their enterprises in growing suburban shopping centers. Simultaneously, these same traders tried to breathe new life into the business part of the city, building passages and underground parking there and modernizing their stores. Some central business areas have been revived, others - slowly and, probably, irreversibly - are getting worse.

Regional shopping centers. A shopping center is a "group of trading enterprises planned, built, owned and managed as a whole, corresponding to their location, size and type of stores served by their trading zone and providing within their territory parking facilities in direct correspondence with the types and sizes of incoming In her stores. "24 The most significant among the shopping centers is the regional one, competing with both the central business district and the shopping centers of the microdistricts.

A regional shopping center, uniting from 40 to 100 or more shops, is a kind of business part of the city in miniature. To be profitable, such a center should serve from one hundred thousand to one million people living within a radius of half an hour's drive from it. In its original form, the regional shopping center often consisted of two large department stores at the ends of a shopping street, and between them was a group of specialized stores. This placement encouraged comparative purchases, because in specialized stores, as a rule, they sold goods competing with those offered in department stores. So, a consumer who wants to buy a pair of jeans could compare the conditions of their purchase in the nearby shops "Sears", "Lord and Taylor", "Just Jeans", "Gap" and "County Sith". Over the years, the composition of regional shopping centers has been replenished with new types of retail enterprises, such as dentistry, fitness clubs and even library departments. In large regional shopping streets today there are several department stores, and the streets themselves are planned in such a way as to ensure unimpeded movement and review of all stores. Many of the newly created shopping streets in the United States are under a common roof, so people can make purchases in any weather.

District shopping centers. The district shopping center includes from 15 to 50 retail stores, serving from 20 to 100 thousand people, 90% of which live within a radius of 1 - 1.5 miles from it. As a rule, in such a center there is one head store - usually a department store or a haberdashery store. The district shopping center may also include a supermarket, a convenience store and professional institutions, and sometimes a bank. With the corner scheme of the shopping center, the head store is usually located at the head of the corner, and when linear, at the center of the segment. Shops located in the immediate vicinity of the main store usually trade in pre-selection goods, and more distant ones - with goods of daily demand.

Shopping centers of microdistricts. Most of all there are shopping centers in the neighborhoods. In this center there are from 5 to 15 shops serving no more than 20 thousand inhabitants. To reach it on foot or by car, buyers spend no more than 5 minutes. It is a center for the sale of consumer goods with a supermarket-type head office and several service companies, such as dry cleaning, self-service laundry, shoe repair shop and a beauty salon. Unlike the larger shopping mall, the neighborhood usually represents a group of haphazardly located stores.

Today, shopping centers account for about one-third of retail turnover, but they seem to have reached their utmost. The sales volume per square meter is falling, the percentage of vacant retail space is growing, bankruptcies are taking place. The creators of shopping centers are developing plans to build more compact centers in medium-sized cities and small towns in areas of the most intensive development, such as the southwestern states. In the meantime, shopping centers are predicted for a wide variety of near future: "They will be more compact, they will be smaller, and their inhabitants will become quite different. Among the few retail outlets that survive, doctors, lawyers, dentists, clinics, contractors, churches, consultative centers, local governments and even libraries will settle. "26