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In the Guinness Book of Records, Richer Sounds warrants* an entry for the highest sales per square foot of any retailer in the UK - £17,000 – for its store on London Bridge Walk in the City.

It is profitable too. Sales are up and its operating margin has soared from 3.4 per sent in 1989 to almost thirteen per sent today. Last year Richer Sound made profits of more than £3 on sales of almost £48m.

Suppliers are keen to do business with this quirky* retailer. “People like Dixon and Comet have so many stores (344 and 262 respectively) that unless you’ve got 5,000 of a model it’s not worth their while putting it into their distribution system”, says Clive Roberts, sales and marketing director of Akai. With Richer, you can do a deal on 30”.

Marketing is a key weapon. Richer Sounds advertises regularly in national newspapers (“We buy late space at a discount,” Richer says) and in alternative magazines such as Private Eye and Viz. every month it produces up to 350,000 copies of brochure pushing latest offers.

The shops are like walk-in warehouses*. Outside, “bargain bins”* tout special offers including audio cassettes for 59p. Inside, compact discs players, tuners and speakers from leading names such as Sony, Akai and Marantz are stacked from floor to ceiling. Banners hanging from the ceiling proclaim: “If you’ve seen it cheaper, we’ll beat that price up to £50”.

Good service is another priority. At Richer Sounds staff is trained not to be pushy*. They all attend two training seminars a year at Richer’s country house in

Yorkshire, where more attention is paid to following the correct administrative procedures.

First-time hi-fi buyers get a call to check that they have plugged in the equipment correctly. Customer receipts include a freephone number they can dial if they have problem. Richer’s own name and office number is supplied too.

The emphasis is on fun. If it’s raining, customers are given a free umbrella. In summer they get a Chilly Willy (a type of ice lolly*). Other seasonal gifts include pies at Christmas and hot-cross buns at Easter. “We have a laugh,” Richer says. “We don’t take ourselves seriously, but we do take our customers seriously.”

From the Business Week

*to warrant: to guarantee *quirky: unusual, untypical

*warehouses: a building where goods are stored before they are sent to shops *bargain bin: a large container with goods sold at reduced prices

*pushy: rude in trying to get what you want

*lolly: (lollipop) – candy made of boiled sugar on a small stick

Ex. 7. Discus in groups unusual methods used in retail outlets in your town to attract customers.

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Ex. 8. Work in two groups (1 and 2). Make up a presentation.

Group 1.

A. Prepare a questionnaire that will be used in a consumer survey of customers of the most popular chain of retail shops in your town. The questionnaire will be used in interview with customers to collect the information, covering these areas:

Customer profile resident / visitor

professional and social background income

regular / occasion level of spending

how they discovered the store Customer satisfaction

service product range prices

communication of information suggestions for improvement

Customer attitude

experience and opinion of promotion actions experience and opinion of mail order and e-commerce

Your questionnaire should contain a mix of question types. Look at the extract from the survey. Which question is:

a)a multiple choice question?

b)a closed question?

c)an open question?

B.Interview students from group 2.

C.Write a report for the chain of retail shops, based on the information you obtained in the interview.

Group 2.

You work as a retail consultant and were asked by the manager of a supermarket to conduct a customer survey following a number of complaints. Write a report giving details of the complaints and your recommendations. Interview students from group 1 to add the list of complaints.

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Ex. 10. Read the information and explain the meaning of words in bold.

Clicks-and-mortar

My name’s John and I own a chain of sports shops. Last year, I started an e-commerce operation, selling goods over the Internet. We’ve done well.

Visitors don’t have trouble of finding what they want, adding items to their shopping cart and paying for them securely by credit card. Last year we had two million unique users (different individual visitors) who generated 35 million hits or page views. That means our web pages viewed a total of 35 million times!

E-commerce or e-tailing has even acted as a form of advertising and increased levels of business in our traditional bricks-and-mortar shops! Pure Internet commerce operations are very difficult. To succeed, I think you need a combination of traditional retailing and e-commerce: click- and-mortar. In our case, this has also helped us solve the last mile problem, the physical delivery of goods to Internet customers: we just deliver from our local stores!

Ex.11. Match expressions with the following meaning. Consult the text above.

1.traditional shops (two possibilities)

2.selling on the Internet (two possibilities)

3.where you put your items before you purchase them

4.physical delivery of goods to Internet customers

5.how many times a web page is viewed

Ex.12. Do you use e-mail? Does e-mail save time or make more work? Should employees send and receive personal emails at work? Why? Read the information about the quickest type of mail. Explain the words in bold.

E-mail is electronic mail. You can send an email to someone, or e-mail them. They will reply to your email or email you back.

The tone of an e-mail message can be like writing or speaking. If you are writing to someone you don’t know you should address this person Dear Mr/Mrs/Ms X. You should keep the style of your message quite formal and finish with

Yours sincerely/Best regards/Best wishes. If you are writing to a friend, you can start with Hi/Hello and write as if you were speaking to the person directly. You can end with All the best/Best.

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Ex.13. Look at the e-mail message and match the labels to the corresponding sections. Is the message written to a friend or unknown person? Is the tone of the text formal, official or informal? Why have you decided so?

a)e-mail of people you wish to send a copy of the message to

b)key words that describe the message you are sending

c)the text of your e-mail

d)e-mail address of people you wish to send a copy of your message to without them knowing that it is a copy

e)the address of the person you are writing to

f)your address

Robert,

Thanks for your e-mail asking for ways of reducing the sales force. Please find attached a Word document with specific plans for this. Please let me know if you can’t read this attachment. I’m copying Ruth Mitchell and Lina Green in on this. Do forward it to the rest of the board if you feel that’s appropriate. Looking forward to your reaction.

Best wishes,

E-mail expressions and abbreviations: