LIVE PROJECT

Customer Relationship Management

A STUDY ON CUSTOMER SATISFACTION AND CUSTOMER

SERVICE PROVIDED AT PANTALOONS, GARIAHAT, KOLKATA

Submitted to:
Dr. K. Shilpa
IIPM, Bangalore

Submitted by:
SHEKHAR JYOTI DAS
17-PGDM-ABPM-35

INDIAN INSTITUTE OF PLANTATION MANAGEMENT BANGALORE

Jnana Bharati Campus, Mallathalli Post

Bangalore-560056
 Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ........................................................................................................................................................ 4
INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................................................................. 5
COMPANY PROFILE ......................................................................................................................................................... 5
INTRODUCTION TO MY PROJECT ........................................................................................................................................ 6
CUSTOMER SERVICE ........................................................................................................................................................... 7
NEED FOR STUDY ................................................................................................................................................................ 8
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION ATTRIBUTES ............................................................................................................................. 9
QUALITY .......................................................................................................................................................................... 9
DIFFERENTIATION ........................................................................................................................................................... 9
ACCESS ............................................................................................................................................................................ 9
FACE VALUE .................................................................................................................................................................... 9
AMBIENCE ...................................................................................................................................................................... 9
LOYALTY PROGRAM .......................................................................................................................................................... 10
OBJECTIVES OF STUDY ...................................................................................................................................................... 11
This marketing research aims to study ......................................................................................................................... 11
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY .............................................................................................................................................. 11
RESEARCH APPROACH .................................................................................................................................................. 11
PRIMARY DATA ............................................................................................................................................................. 11
SECONDARY DATA ........................................................................................................................................................ 11
SURVEY DESIGN ............................................................................................................................................................ 11
SAMPLING PLAN ............................................................................................................................................................... 12
a. Sample size .......................................................................................................................................................... 12
b. Sample unit: ......................................................................................................................................................... 12
c. Contact method ................................................................................................................................................... 12
INTERPRETATION .............................................................................................................................................................. 13
1. Age ............................................................................................................................................................................ 13
2. Occupation................................................................................................................................................................ 13
3. Frequency of visiting pantaloons .............................................................................................................................. 14
4. What is the most important factor that influence you to buy from pantaloons? .................................................... 14
5. Which of the following point you want improvement?............................................................................................ 15
6. Variety & quality of products available at pantaloons ............................................................................................. 15
7. How is your experience at CSD (customer service desk)? ........................................................................................ 16
8. Please rate the exchange policy of Pantaloons ........................................................................................................ 16
9. How is your billing experience at pantaloons? ......................................................................................................... 17
RESEARCH AND FINDINGS ................................................................................................................................................ 18
CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................................................................... 19
RECOMMENDATIONS ....................................................................................................................................................... 20
ANNEXURE ........................................................................................................................................................................ 21
BIBILOGRAPHY .................................................................................................................................................................. 27
 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
I have done a project related to customer satisfaction and the customer services provided at
pantaloons. The project title is “A study on customer satisfaction and customer service
provided at Pantaloons, Gariahat, Kolkata”

This project report throws light on the reasons behind customer’s decision of choosing
Pantaloons for the purchase of Apparels and various other products. Pantaloons as a Retail
Brand is one of the fast-growing players in the Indian retail industry and offers a deep
insight to the industry.

For completion of this report, a survey was conducted and for fulfilment of questionnaires, a
sample size of 80 was selected. Among those who were interviewed consist of housewives,
professionals, even students. Though the sample size taken was small but it was varied to
overcome all the odds. A structured questionnaire was constructed to measure the responses of
the respondents on suitable scale so that it could be analysed. Primary data collection was done
via questionnaires and secondary data collection through company websites.

Through survey, effect of various factors like ambience of the store, discount and
convenience came in light and the reason of consumers choosing Pantaloons over other
retail outlets became visible.
 INTRODUCTION

COMPANY PROFILE

Pantaloons, previously owned by the Future Group, has recently been taken over by Aditya
Birla fashion and retail Limited, a US $4 billion diversified industry and India's largest
manufacturer of linen fabric.

Pantaloons Fashion & Retail Limited is a premium Indian retail chain. The first Pantaloons retail
store was launched at Gariahat, Kolkata in 1997. According to the Brand Trust 2014 report, a
study conducted by Trust Research Advisory, Pantaloons featured among 50 most trusted
brands in India. The company provides a premium and complete shopping experience to its
customers through its variety of 220 prestigious brands. Pantaloons, with a presence across
ABFRL hosts India's largest fashion network, with over 7,000 POS across over 375 cities and
towns, in addition to 2,200+ exclusive ABRL brand outlets. With more than 14 million loyalty
members as of March '16, ABFRL has a big bouquet of loyalty programmes in India.

Pantaloons offers multiple accessories and apparel brands including categories for men,
women and kids. The collection covers ethnic and western apparels for kids, men, women
complemented by a wide range of accessories. The variety of brands and products has
helped Pantaloons to become one of the best retail brands in India.
Pantaloons offers, customers a variety of apparels and accessories from the globally
renowned brands. The labels for men in western wear cover Rig, Lombard, Bare Leisure, SF
Jeans, Bare Denim, JM Sport, Byford, F Factor and trendy brands like John Miller and Akkriti
as ethnic wear.
The women’s section includes the private labels — Bare Leisure, Bare Denim, Rig, Honey,
Ajile and Annabelle— in western, as well as the ethnic wears from RangManch, Trishaa and
Akkriti. Popular brands as Lee Cooper, Biba are also included.

Kids wear like Bare Denim, Bare Leisure, Rig and exclusive brands like Chalk, Poppers, Pink &
Blue In its challenge to meet the consumer’s varying fashion needs, Pantaloons has
introduced new brands including Candies, Alto Moda, Spykar, AND, Turtle, Global Desi,
109F, Chemistry, and Giny & Jony. Pantaloons is a vital part of the prestigious Aditya Birla
Group, a USD 40 billion Indian MNC, operating in 40 countries across the globe with over
130,000 employees, accepted as ‘India’s Most Preferred Apparel Retail Brand’ in the Brand
Equity Survey 2014, Pantaloons continues to meet consumer trust and confidence. With its
overwhelming collection of lifestyle apparel brands, the company is focusing on growth
while creating fresh fashion.
 INTRODUCTION TO MY PROJECT

My project title is A study on customer satisfaction and customer service provided at

Pantaloons, Gariahat, Kolkata and involves studying customer’s satisfaction within the store
and interaction with them to understand their needs and satisfaction level with the product
and services being provided by Pantaloons.

It is essential to understand customer’s needs to serve them better and to do so, management
should understand key purchasing factors and prepare themselves. We must satisfy and even
felicitate our customer with the value of our products and services to gain their loyalty and
repeat purchases. Customer satisfaction should be the initial target of any organization. One of
the best ways to find out is to ask them using customer satisfaction surveys.

Employee and the management of the store can use the survey information to identify
opportunities for ongoing process improvement and to monitor the impact of those
improvements.

An unsatisfied customer will exaggerate about their negative experience. A satisfied

customer will only tell a few people about their positive experience. So a retailer should
always think in that way to satisfy their customer and delighting them with the services
which enhances differentiation.
 CUSTOMER SERVICE

Customer service in pantaloons is a series of activities designed to enhance the level of

customer satisfaction –:

o Defective or broken product should be exchanged, often only with a receipt

but within a specified time frame.

o Pantaloons has a desk assigned to deal with returns, exchanges and

complaints and performs related functions at the point of sale.

o Customer service is normally an integral part of a company’s customer value

proposition.

o From the point of view of an overall engineering effort, customer service plays
an unavoidable role in an organization's ability to generate income and
revenue.
o From that perspective, customer service should be included as an overall
approach to systematic improvement.

o Some have stated that the level of customer service in pantaloons has
decreased in recent years, and this can be defined as a lack of support or
understanding at the executive and middle management hierarchy of an
organization.

o Customer service is an organization's ability to fulfil their customers' wants

and needs. Excellent customer service is the ability of an organization to
consistently exceed the customer's expectations.
 NEED FOR STUDY

• Customer service is an unavoidable part of a company’s customer value proposition.

These are the parameters that indicates the level of focus of any retailer to provide
services to the customers.

• It is very important to make a point that unless a retailer is not aware of the customer
expectations a service, it becomes quite difficult to set his own service standards for
the store.
• Customer service may be employed to create such competitive advantage as a service
proposition would be harder to copy for competitors. A company may try to
differentiate itself from the competition through better customer service.

• The consistent delivery of superior service requires careful design and execution of a
whole system of activities that includes people, technology, and processes.

• Technology has provided a wide range of customer service tools. They range from
support websites and the ability to have live chats with technical staff to databases
tracking individual customers' preferences, payment methods, pattern of buying etc.,
and providing products and service responses based on this advanced data. Specialist
software that is designed for the tracking of service levels and for helping recognize
areas for improvement are often integrated into other enterprise operational software
tools such as ERP software.
 CUSTOMER SATISFACTION ATTRIBUTES

QUALITY

If you have a poor product or service, it affects the satisfaction level. There’s a amount of
aggressive PR or marketing that can make a product or service sell. So, product should be up
to the mark.

DIFFERENTIATION

In Kolkata market, there’s usually many players like big bazaar, max, Westside, central etc.
Customer service may not work when choosing the appropriate product or service, but
word of mouth certainly plays into customer satisfaction. If a product is the best in quality
and discounts, then it’s necessary to separate it from the rest of the brands, through
customer service, marketing and product quality.

ACCESS

The era of digitalization has made finding products and services a snap. What Emailing
and finding products and services on the Internet has become such a trend, companies
have invested millions in making sure access is free and extremely easy.

FACE VALUE

When a product or service costs high, but is worth it, the value which becomes
acceptable to the consumer. When a consumer specifically buys trousers from peter
England or bare denim, the positive features of the products outweighs the cost, creating
a strong sense of good value. Pantaloons should have more international brands which is
rated excellent by the customers.

AMBIENCE

When the customers shop at pantaloons, the first impression that they look for is of a
clean, safe and well-organized environment. The store’s ambience affects the purchasing
behaviour of the customers immensely.
 LOYALTY PROGRAM

The Pantaloons Green card, loyalty program, has been designed exclusively for Pantaloons'
customers to enhance customer satisfaction. Presently offered to over 4 million members,
the programme entitles members to discounts, point’s redemption and special privileges at
all Pantaloons stores.

The card has four tiers depending on the year's shopping. When a customer shops, the card
updates with increasing privileges and discounts.

The benefits covered under Green card include discounts, complimentary parking,
complimentary delivery of altered garments, relaxed exchange policy, complimentary
shipping, exclusive sale preview, exclusive billing counters.
 OBJECTIVES OF STUDY

This marketing research aims to study:

1. To check if the availability of goods and variety of products and services attract
customers towards Pantaloons.

2. To measure the satisfaction level of overall shopping experience at Pantaloons.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

RESEARCH APPROACH:

Depending upon the objectives of the research, the most suitable marketing research
approach is “Exploratory research”. The purpose is to find out the experience of customers
while shopping in pantaloons.

PRIMARY DATA

To collect primary data best way is to interact with people directly it can be through
direct interviews and questionnaires. Both these methods have used for collection of
primary data.

SECONDARY DATA

Secondary data is collected from company websites and various Literature reviews. As
Pantaloons is daily in news because of its wedding fest and different offers, so I benefited
a lot from updates on net.

SURVEY DESIGN

Random stratified sampling was chosen for research. The CSD of pantaloons Gariahat was
selected as the study area and people from this area were selected for filling up of
questionnaires and collecting responses due to convenience of location.
 SAMPLING PLAN:
Sampling plan for this project is divided into 3 steps:

a. Sample size: A sample size of 80 respondents was chosen. Though small sample
size but it consists of varied respondents to overcome any error at the time of
generalization of result.
b. Sample unit: Pantaloons store at Gariahat, Kolkata was chosen as sample unit.
c. Contact method: Questionnaire method was used to view responses of respondents.
 INTERPRETATION
1. Age

As we can see, the age below 25 is 71%, which is much more than that of other segments.
The young population is dominant if we consider the numbers. The maximum number of
footfalls, are due to the young population.

2. Occupation

The student segment that is 65.8%, dominates the footfall especially on weekends. So,
offers should be modified and approach can be friendlier for their conversion and retention.
The service sector gets a 20% of vote because of the festive occasions and sales.
3. Frequency of visiting pantaloons.

Most of the respondents have visited pantaloons every month as it covers 50%.the other
segment that visits pantaloons once in a 6 month are 32%. The reasons being pantaloons is
easily reachable and covers a large variety of apparel and cosmetics.

4. What is the most important factor that influence you to buy from pantaloons?

Evidently pantaloons have a wide variety of products and the coverage is 54%. Better
quality has been voted 30% better services 11%. Customers prefer to shop at pantaloons
rather to for an exclusive store having lesser variety
5. Which of the following point you want improvement?

As we see in this chart, 37% of respondent’s complaint the staffs be reminding them of the
products and service along with the terms and conditions. 29% of the customer suggest that
the services should be a little faster especially during wedding fest or weekends. Other
issues such as parking lot space, baggage counter issues are also being taken care of.

6. Variety & quality of products available at pantaloons.

48 out of 80 respondents have rated well with the existing variety and quality of products,
19 respondents have voted excellent and 10 people have chosen average.
7. How is your experience at CSD (customer service desk)?

The service quality of a store can be sensed from the service desk and 60% of the respondents
are satisfied with the CSD where as 24.1%of customers reacted excellent.12.7% of customers
rated average. The personal interaction with the respondents revealed that they had mainly
some minor issues regarding cards and points which was handled immediately.

8. Please rate the exchange policy of Pantaloons.

Exchange policies have certain facilities for loyalty members as in they’ll get a 90 days
extension for exchange and 54.4% of respondents rated good where as 26.6% of the
customer voted average and the reason being no exchange on footwear and selected
garments. Credit note issuance is another aspect of it
9. How is your billing experience at pantaloons?

Among 80 respondents, 40.5% are satisfied with the billing experience whereas 25.3% of
the respondents have stated average because of the numbers of counter available. 16.5%
respondents have below average of experience level because of the time factors. Excellent
and poor rating is 11.4% and 6.3% accordingly.
 RESEARCH AND FINDINGS

This research helped us identify following problems where Pantaloons has an

immense scope of improvement:

1. People were found to be a little dissatisfied with the ambience of Pantaloons as

compared to some other outlets but mostly were overall satisfied.

2. Majority of respondents were complaining about the variety of products, Different

sizes are not available, footwear needs improvement at Pantaloons.

3. Ladies complaint about jeweller variety is not there, there should have more variety.

4. Location was one of the main reasons which attracted consumers towards Pantaloons
and it took less time for majority of respondents to reach Pantaloons.

5. As Pantaloons operates in discount retailing, it was assumed that Pantaloons’ discount

and low prices were one of the magnum opus for customers but respondents feel that the
discount is not that promising and it should be enhanced.

6. Parking is also a problem at Pantaloons and some of the respondents were dissatisfied
with the parking lot at Pantaloons, as it provides lesser parking space to customers. Mostly,
Employees of Pantaloons use the parking space provide by that mall only.
 CONCLUSION

This research report aims to study consumer attitude towards Pantaloons and highlights its
strengths and weaknesses in order that Pantaloons can fight the competition in a smarter
way. Though Pantaloons captures a large market and is giving competition to big players like
Vishal mega mart and big bazaar, retail in India is a booming sector nowadays and
Pantaloons should try to benefit more from it. Recommendations given should be
considered by Pantaloons to come forth as a winner in long run.

Now there are 65% of the customers comes in between 25-35. Therefore, data suggests
that they should emphasizing on this dominant segment to add more loyal members and
maximize the revenue. Providing a better billing experience to the customers is vital for
every retailer. This is a bottleneck where customer can really get exhausted if they stand
in a queue to get the billing done, even for 10 minutes.

The factors that attract customers to the Pantaloons, as in, the store mainly focus on their
in-house brand availability and value of money. Many customers believe that Pantaloons
have their own branded products to offer the customers with an affordable price.
 RECOMMENDATIONS

This research throws light on various pros and cons of Pantaloons and can help
Pantaloons to improve on different aspects to have an advantage over its peers. Based
on the analysis and findings of my research, I have given following recommendations:

1. Pantaloons needs to improve variety of products and provide space for children coming
with their parents for entertainment and have fun so that visiting Pantaloons will be exciting
for them.

2. Pantaloons should include more variety of products in its basket to acquire the
convenience of availability of all apparels under a roof provided to its customers. Variety of
products should specially be increased in traditional wear for women, jewellery, cosmetics,
Footwear and more varieties in watches.

3. More computers should be included at exchange counter and number of billing

counters should be increased especially during the sales and festive season to fasten
the billing process and minimize large queues.

4. If possible more lucrative discounts and offers should be implemented to attract

more customers. The schemes and offers should be analysed before generalizing to
customers

5. Staff should be trained up to the mark to assist people and to make them understand
the benefits of green card membership which will strengthen Customer loyalty.

6. Good quality of merchandise should be which should be trendy and compete with the
latest market trend.

7. The Cashiering should be optimized to save time of customers and avoid unnecessary
queues.
 ANNEXURE

Survey on the customer satisfaction and services provided at pantaloons

Gariahat Kolkata

1. Age
o below 25

o 25-35

o 35-45

o 45-55

o above 55

2. Occupation

o student

o self employed

o service

o homemaker

o other

3. What is your casual preference while buying products from organized retail outlets?

o pantaloons

o central

o west side

o big bazaar
4. From which source made you buy products from

pantaloons?

o Internet

o news paper

o hoardings

o person

o Other...

5. Frequency of visiting pantaloons.

o first time

o every week

o every month

o once in a 6 month

o once in a year

6. What is the most important factor that influence you to buy from pantaloons?

o Better service standard

o better quality of products

o Variety of products

o price

o Other...
7. Does pantaloons reminding & intimating their store discounts & prices to you in
a proper way?

o Yes

o No

o Maybe

8. Which of the following point you want improvement?

o Service should be faster

o Staffs could be friendlier

o Staff should communicate all the points to the consumer

o Others

9. Availability of staff in a timely manner.

o Excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor
10. Variety & quality of products available at

pantaloons?

o excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor

11. How is your experience at CSD (customer service

desk)?

o excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor
12. What is your opinion about Green card (loyalty) facility at pantaloons?

o excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor

13. Lease rate the exchange policy of Pantaloons.

o excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor

14. What is your usage experience of pantaloons products?

o excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor
15. Please rate overall facilities like water, sanitary, washroom, parking etc. at
Pantaloons.

o excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor

16. Rate your opinion about wedding fest offer in pantaloons?

o excellent

o good

o average

o below average

o poor

17. Feedback
 BIBILOGRAPHY

1. Principles of marketing By PHILIP KOTLER.

2. Wikipedia.

3. http://pantaloon.futurebazaar.com/indexPantaloon.jsp.

4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retailing_in_India

5. www.pantaloons.com

6. www.glassdoor.com

7. Pantaloonfashion.com

8. www.trendin.com