Situation
A Greek electronics retail chain had high variations in sales results per store and per product line sold. The company wanted to understand "why" these variations were happening, and how it could overcome them in a positive manner.
Challenge
Grow sales by identifying what made some stores "winners" and leveraging this knowledge across the whole network.
Response
Using a combination of business analysis and mathematical modeling, stores were clustered according to their sales profile. This showed that the higher performing stores had a different merchandise mix which caused all products to perform well, rather than just rely on "stars".
With a clear profile of the targeted sales profile, the company was now able to change the merchandise mix per store and make sure that especially new store openings "'got it right first time". The approach was particularly effective with small surface stores in provinces, because instead of carrying a large assortment (conventional thinking), the chain only focused on the product lines associated with the profile of the successful store template. The sales growth obtained a the confirmation of the conclusions reached by the analysis.
