Retail

Location is the most critical business parameter in retail. All core business activities are focused in the stores. The store is the primary point of interaction with customers, it is where sales are concluded, inventories are kept and most employees are based. The management of store locations is a highly dynamic process. At strategic level, this would involve new opening, removal and discontinuance decisions. At operating level, you might need to devise merchandising or promotional plans unique to individual stores.

Some crucial factors for store location management are :

	Macro-demographics
	Traffic-flow
	Competitor locations
	Urban development trend

All these factors are concerned about geography and there exist subtle inter-locking relationships between them. These factors should therefore be best analyzed collectively on a common geographic platform like China infoMap. Some typical examples are shown below :

Combined Thematic Maps on Demographics and Store Data :

Store Map with Competitors grouped by different symbols :

Buffer Zones around Stores :

Thematic Map Drawn on Product Sales Mix of Individual Stores :