Sunday, October 18, 2009

A truly different store!!

Have always advocated the concept of a truly different store and during a recent trip of mine I came across this interestingly different store. Please note the name of the outlet “Coconut World”. As customers we were driving past this place and after noticing this unique name, we made an U Turn and came back to visit this store.

Of course the expectations that this name evoked were very different from what we actually experienced. The name created an imagery of a store with a whole range of products made from coconut and related materials. We expected to see handicrafts, curios, food stuff, etc. (Hint, Hint – Maybe they should realign the assortment in line with the branding!!)

What we discovered was a small cafe kind of place (Note the rack of tender coconut on a rack outside) which served a lot of coconut related food items. To be fair to the store, they also had several coconut related products including a very innovative one; coconut pickle.
Now, that was one thing I never expected to find anywhere in the world; Coconut pickle. I don’t particularly fancy the stuff but my son says that it is the best thing he has tasted ever!

Which brings me to another point of my basic retail model; differentiated assortment. There is a huge potential to this interesting format. How it pans out is dependent on so many factors.

But, they have managed to attract attention and a share of my mind space by ensuring two elements of my basic retail model;
  • A truly different store
  • Differentiated and relevant assortment
Hope to see and share many more such stories with all of you, which illustrate how well the basic retail model works in real life!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Rajesh, while it's truly a one-of-its kind store but after reading the name 'Coconut World' i immidiately thought about coconut water and food related items. It was quite interesting that you thought of an assortment of cocnut items. Does perception play an important role in retail format!!?? I think yes and no retailer, desi or international has paid any attention to it so far!

Balakrishna said...

It would be interesting to trace the etymology of this outlet. It could have started as a one-place stop for coir related products, but gradually it evolved into an eatery. But what caught my attention was "subicsha" written on the board.And again, if it had been a coir products' related store then it would have had its wares displayed out in the front.

ASWATHI said...

ITS VERY NICE TO WRITE ABOUT SUBICSHA AS IT BENEFITS MORE THAN 7OOO BPL FAMILIES...RECENTLY WE HV VISITED THEIR PRODUCTION CENTRE ..KEEP ON WRITIN ABOUT THEM IN DETAIL...EVERY ACTIVITIES THERE IS CARRIED OUT BY WOMEN ..THE KERALITES SHOULD BUY THESE PRODUCTS APART FROM STICKIN ON TO THE USUAL BRAND NAMES..WE MUST PROMOTE THE SELF HELP GROUPS...

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