Lulu Hypermarket is a department store chain and retail enterprise founded in the year 2000 as the part of Lulu Group International. The head office of Lulu Group International is located in Abu Dhabi, UAE and currently is managed by Mr. M. A. Yousuf Ali.
As of the 2013, Lulu Hypermarket is one of the world’s fastest growing retail chains the with 35 hypermarkets and over 105 outlets and supermarkets in the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC) running with over 30,000 employees. Currently there are 7 Lulu hypermarkets operating in the Sultanate of Oman and by the end of the year 2014 the largest Lulu will be opened in Muscat as the expansion to its Bauwsher Branch.
Activity and Services
The major aim and activity of Lulu Hypermarkets is to provide goods and services carrying a wide retail facility including full groceries lines such as fruits, vegetables, meat, poultry, spices, dairy products and the other general merchandise such as accessories, clothing, optics, tools, and households in addition to the pharmacies, money exchange and fast foods. These provided services allow the customers to fulfill all their daily shopping needs in one purchase.
Competitors in the Market
Lulu Hypermarket has established a successful retail network in the GCC region with a complete goods sourcing, reasonable price and convenient shopping to the customers which all resulted to provide competitive services along with its main competitors in the market such as Carrefour, Spinies, Al Fair, Mars, Saffeer and Sultan Center.
Price, Cost and the Profit
Customers have different demands while there is a raising commercial competition in the market to attract and serve more customers which leads to the more profits. Price affects the volume of production, and hence the profit. On the other hand with an increase in the price there is the possibility that the customers start looking for different options with other rivals in the market which will lower their dependency on your business.
It is crucial to keep a balance between the price, cost and profit. Modifications to the marketing strategy of the concerning business, raising more convenient customer-related activities, and also understanding the value of the product to the customers will result to a better control over the sales and definitely a profitable account.
Ownership of Lulu Hyper Market
The type of ownership of the Lulu hypermarket is (LLC) which stand for Limited Liability Company. A limited liability company is an independent and distinguished which provides the owners of the business protection against any losses that a business might face. Her some features of LLC:
‘ Limited Liability: the owners of Limited Liability Company have the liability protection of company. The Limited Liability Company exists as an independent entity like a lot of companies. Members cannot be held personally liable for debts unless they have signed a personal guarantee.
‘ Flexible Profit Distribution: LLC can select varying forms of distribution of profits. Unlike a common partnership where the split is 50-50, LLC have much more flexibility.
‘ No Minutes: Organizations are required to possess formal minutes, have meetings, and record resolutions. LLC business structure requires no corporate minutes or resolutions and easier to work.
‘ Flow through Taxation: the losses, profits, and expenses for all business flow through the company to the individual members. Avoidance of double taxation of paying corporate tax and individual tax. This will be a tax advantage, but it can be circumstances in favor of the corporate tax structure.
Organization structure
The organizational structure it’s form and part of the administrative hierarchy of the institution showing the locations of administrative functions and its connections and relationships between individuals also shows the lines of authority and responsibility within the organization, where can the beholder to the organizational structure for any organization to identify the units and departments within the organization, responsibilities, and authorities there.
There are many types of organizational structures we can classify the type of Lulu organizational structure as the structure of the organization Executive. It’s based on the central authority of the highest summit, where there is a head and one of the highest take decisions and the power line descended from the top to the bottom.
Through observation of the organizational structure of Lulu and we found some advantage and disadvantage such as:
Advantage
‘ clarity and simplicity
‘ lines of authority straight from the top to the bottom
‘ specific responsibility
‘ Commitment and obedience
Disadvantage
‘ Granting full powers to the heads where it is difficult to achieve cooperation and coordination between the various departments.
‘ Increase the administrative burden on administrators because they oversee both large and small.
Lulu hypermarket is a huge retail departmental store with many outlets all around the Oman and other countries. The marketing department of Lulu Hypermarket is set to be well planned and organized because of its marketing coverage and customer orientation.
The list of activities of the marketing department in Lulu Hypermarket is
‘ Market Research
‘ Market Planning
‘ Market Development
‘ Promotion
‘ Physical Distribution
Market Research
A market research will be done by the marketing department to understand the various demands of the customers. This method basically helps to identify the needs of the customers, the taste and preference of the customers and what they are willing to buy, when they are likely to buy etc.
Market Planning
Market planning is done to achieve the marketing objectives as well as to achieve the company objectives. The company objective and company mission will always support the marketing planning function.
Market development
Development means the product planning and development, by doing the market research, understand the type of customers and the needs and demands of the customers. By identifying the needs of the customers the development of new products are also done to meet the desires of the customers.
Promotion
Promotion includes various aspects of marketing. Before promoting the product buying and assembling will be done and standardization and grading will be done. Promoting a specific brand in the market with its competitors is a major task faced by the marketing department. Attractive packaging and design includes in the promotional activity.
Physical Distribution
In this scenario Lulu Hypermarket has catch the eyes of every customers because of the trust that the customers have within the company. In this competitive environment, customers prefer products that are always easily reachable. Physical distribution network helps to reach the materials in the store at the earliest. Various physical intermediaries are also included between the chain of manufacturers and consumers.
Lulu Hypermarket has many marketing initiatives used to attract customers and to activate trade movement, such as:
Sales promotion
Sales promotions have become the usual concept of promoting the products in the market. Lulu hypermarket sales promotions are different from all the other competitors in the market. The promotions include not only the product awareness and giving publicity it also involves audience participation. Various sales promotions like 50% discount sales and half pay back are the most popular sales promotions at lulu Hypermarket.
Pull awards
There are offers on the withdrawal of numerous awards. The most important and biggest prize is dream car.
Lulu products on Demand
Lulu products have also launched in the markets to compete with other brand products in the market. The brand name Lulu has occupied the space in many products.
When marketing department has to execute its objectives completely there will be other departments associated and linked to it also. For achieving the target of the marketing department, it has to coincide with:
Human Resource Department
Human Resource department includes the manpower facilities and organizing the marketing programs efficiently. To channelize the marketing research with [professionals and executing the market planning objective and implementing them requires professional experts and experienced personals. This department plays a major role with the marketing department.
Finance Department
Lulu Hypermarket financial department is more confidential and supporting department for the marketing department. Marketing department has to be supported with financial department. Cash flow needed to market each product into the market right from the planning of new products, its raw material requirements, packing, labeling, and its transportation charges to distribute the product to the markets and outlets all requires financial support. The marketing mix completes only with the major support of the finance department. The finance department initiatives the marketing department even after the product is launched and promoted in the market, for example: after sales services, customer feedback collections, maintenance requirements etc.
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CONCLUSION
In the end, we have study the company and we get to know that the Lulu is one of the biggest and important hypermarkets in the Arabian Gulf and some other countries. This led to having a lot of competitors. Also we get to know that LLC is the ownership of Lulu. Organizational structure in Lulu contain the human resources (HR) department, Information Technology (IT) department, Marketing department, Purchase department, Account department and others department witch care of business operations within Lulu and cares of staff and responsible for pensions and provide safety for them and also provide the needs of customers, etc. Also we reached that Marketing department has some activities, such as Market Research, Market Planning, Market Development, etc. As a global hypermarket, Lulu must contain marketing initiatives to attract customers for example, sales promotion, Pull awards and Lulu products on Demand. Good to know that human rescores department and Finance Department are involved in these initiatives. It’s great to know that amount of information about Lulu Hypermarket, especially when we consider ourselves permanent customers.
LIST OF REFERENCES
‘ Reuting, J. (2013). LLC, 19 April(2014)http://www.legalzoom.com/llc-guide/limited-liability-company.html
‘ Zahorsky,D.(2010).Limited Liability Company101, 9 April (2014) file:///G:/Limited%20Liability%20Company%20101.htm
‘ Fried, Jason (April 2011). Organizational Theory. http://www.investopedia.com/terms/o/organizational-structure.asp. 21 April 2014