The Operation Management

And

The large-scales retailers

Contents

Introduction

I) Notion of Quality

A) Definition

B) Applications to large-scale retailing

II) E-Commerce

A) Definition

B) Costs of E-Commerce

Conclusion

Introduction

In France, large-scale retailers such as Leclerc, Auchan, or even Carrefour appeared in the middle of the 20th century. These stores are known for their low prices for food or even clothes. They are cheaper than the others grocery stores. We will apply theory that we saw during the course in order to explain how they did and how they do today.

We will try to explain how French large-scales retailers used Operations Management to develop themselves. We will also see how these retailers deal with the different evolutions of Operations Management. When I talk about large-scale retailers, I talk about the products sold in stores or even services proposed by these retailers.

I will not talk about each notions of the Operations Management because it would need me more than 2000 words and some theories are applicable to this type of business. That is why I focused on two notions which seemed important to talk about because their evolution had been very important for many years.

First we will see what quality is and how it is applied to this sector of activity. Then we will talk about the arrived of the E-Commerce and how it is used by large-scales retailers.

I) Notion of Quality

A) Definition

Quality represents all the characteristics that a product or a service has. In this part, we focus on products because large-scale retailers are specialized in products sells. Most of the time, quality is synonymic of performance for the product.

Quality exists because of the identification and the satisfaction of customer needs. Indeed when we think that a product is a good quality product, it is because