Blizzards of sale from online shopping giants have not deterred much their local competitors, as feared until very recently. With modern retail giants in consumer goods and electronics space intruding into the market small businessmen are firm with the family-owned establishments they have developed and nurtured for decades.
The local consumer durable retailers of the city are not only daring to compete with online shops but are also betting big on special offers and lucky draws to take them on in ongoing and upcoming festive season.
“The fear element of business getting affected with opening of Single Brand Outlets (SBO) of Sony, Samsung, lG, Videocon and likewise, and Multi-Brand Outlets (MBO) like Reliance Digital, Big Bazaar and others has vanished by now. It happened, because we learnt to take them on in their own way of discounts and special offers,” said Prakash Kamalia, the second generation owner of Kamalia Sons.
And this is something that every other established consumer durable and electronics retailer has been trying and doing from some years. “We are offering special lucky draw for our customers, which is valid till end of this month. We are offering 24-carat gold coins to many more to our customers, other than at least some discount from our own profit to our valued customers,” said Irfan Ahmed, son of Bharat Electronics Proprietor Gayasuddin Ahmed.
“We have a strong family relations with Kamalia Sons, as we have been purchasing stuff from here since long. This time I am here to buy a refrigerator and they have given us special discount which is additional to what the refrigerator brand has been offering. We don’t go to purchase big ticket item online or from modern retailers, as they have so many formalities in case the product has an after-sales issue,” said Jyoti Jha, one customer, who had driven down from Tati Silve, some 15 Km away from city to buy a refrigerator in this festive season on discount.
After sales issue is something which every family owned and established business in this space is betting big on. “I have been sitting in my shop since last three decades here. People know me well and if they have some issue with the product, there are cases that I have even changed it at my own risk. But modern retailers have their own limitations in this regard,” said Kamalia. He added that this was a major differentiator between online and offline mode of retailing.
He added that the expansion in product range was also a big tool to compete with big giants. “We are adding mobile phones in 2-3 days, as it makes big difference if customer gets complete range of any brand in one store,” Kamalia said.
A senior official of a consumer durable and electronics MBO admitted that the brand was getting considerable amount of competition from established city retailers, because they enjoyed an edge of being familiar since years.