Background: It has been shown that companies that lived under protected conditions for a long time have had difficulties to adapt to major changes. With that in mind an even more extensive low-cost competition in the Swedish grocery market will make a threat for the traditional grocery stores' long-term survival. The question then becomes, which strategies will be successful and lead to higher customer loyalty. Problem: Are the traditional grocery stores using strategies that can compete in addition to pricing and will those strategies lead to long-term survival? Objective: Is to analyse and evaluate two traditional grocery stores' strategies and to examine whether these are consistent with customer demand. Approach: First we have created a more fundamental understanding of the situation in the Swedish grocery market. Then we have implemented two interviews in each grocery store. The first one is done with the store manager and the second one is done whit one of the staff members. Finally, we have also performed a survey directed to the stores' customers. Basic perspective: The study is based on a Relationship perspective and a Transactional perspective. Theories: “Theory of Value Star and Value Chain”, “Service Profit Chain”, “Value Theory”, “Value creation processes”,” Brand Theory” and “Involvement Theory”. Empiricism: Is based on the information gathered by interviews done in the two grocery stores and customers' responses to the survey. Analysis: Is based on the empirical data. Results: The study shows that both stores have customers that are relatively highinvolved and that both of these stores work with high involvement values. Conclusion: Both stores have strategies that extend beyond pricing. However, there are major shortcomings in terms of involving the customers in the process of creating value, which also affects customer loyalty. The stores' different structure of ownership also affects how they are organized and make decisions. Currently, Coop has a bigger problem than ICA because of low customer loyalty and limited adaptability.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:sh-9399 |
| Date | January 2011 |
| Creators | Vespo, Roberto, Johansson, Måns |
| Publisher | Södertörns högskola, Institutionen för ekonomi och företagande, Södertörns högskola, Institutionen för ekonomi och företagande |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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