Start a Grocery store, think like a supermarket; You’ll become one

Become an Entrepreneur, Become an Entrepreneur after 40, Become an Entrepreneur after 50, life of an entrepreneur, Think big
I have used analogy of a grocery store and a supermarket since it is easy for every one to understand. If you are an entrepreneur who wants to start a grocery store, you would definitely want to become a supermarket one day. But your attitude and each action matters.

So whatever you start, you have to think big. I will explain with examples.

Start a grocery store,think & act like a supermarket; You’ll become one

By Grocery store, I visualize a village grocery store having one owner and utmost one or two more assistants who will help customers and also may serve as deliverymen. The owner and the assistant share all duties as per the requirements of the moment.(I repeat ..of the moment). There are no designations and no instructions as to who does what. Everyone does everything.

The owner is the sales man (indoor & outdoor), accountant, cashier, quality controller (!), supplier management officer (!!), customer relationship officer (!), stock management officer (!) , marketing manager and so on. We have seen many grocery stores which work to our satisfaction as a customer. So there is nothing wrong as long as the customer is happy. But it depends on you as the owner what you want to achieve.

Will he able to duplicate the same grocery store multiple times? Will he be able to start a super market and run successfully even if he has all the financial means? The answer to both is NO.

He might be able to open one or two more Grocery stores within reachable distance from one another, but he will never be able to start one in the next village.

Start a supermarket but act like a Grocery store; You’ll become a very big grocery store

If you suddenly inherit lot of money, you might be able to start a supermarket directly without having to go through the struggles of a grocery store.
But it is tempting to supervise each and every activity of the supermarket and give directions to each and every individual. Of course since you have enough money, you have appointed experts in each of their fields as your employees. But if you are thinking like a grocery store, you would want to know everything that goes on and want to know each action of every employee.
So slowly each employee gets demoralized. More over each employee, especially key decision makers will be hesitant to take decisions, because that may not be the course of action the owner wants. Very soon you’ll become a grocery store of enormous size.
The owner should define guidelines and then should get out of the way of daily micro management

How to think like a supermarket when starting a grocery store?

  • First of all, give a great name to the grocery store similar to that of a supermarket. It will make you keep thinking like a supermarket
  • Of course you should know what is a supermarket and should have a rough idea how it works.
  • You should notice that there are different people for carrying out each functions of the supermarket
  • You should notice that the owner does not involve in day to day activities at all
  • You should notice that in spite of huge number of customers, all the required items are available in all the racks at all times. So some one is managing the stocks efficiently
  • It is worth noticing that there are special promotions and marketing campaigns going on at different times which is by some other experts inside.
Even though you understand all of the above, your first reaction is that they are a big supermarket, but I am a small grocery store.
As you have never worked inside a supermarket you do not know most of these intricacies. You only know that you want to become a supermarket one day. If you have a strong desire, it is simple. Find out someone who has experience inside a supermarket. It can be many people who got individual experience in different fields of a supermarket. To start with you can easily find out one sales man to start with.He knows more than you.
Then start implementing systems slowly in your grocery store also, so that you can easily duplicate and start more and bigger stores, eventually becoming a supermarket.
So whether you start a grocery store or a supermarket, think like a chain of supermarkets.

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