| dc.description.abstract | The emerging trend in retail business in recent years is the shopping malls. Many retailers prefer operation of their business in malls despite the existence of other retail outlets. It becomes interesting to determine how they perceive these malls. This study was in response to this need.
To achieve the stated objective, a descriptive study was conducted on the retailers in Nairobi's three shopping malls. The population of interest in this study comprised of retailers in Nairobi's three shopping malls, namely Yaya Center, Sarit Center and Village Market). According to the numbers as provided by the respective management offices of the malls as at September 2006, there were 357 (Yaya Center, 97; Sarit Center, 123; and Village Market, 137). Stratified sampling was used to sample the respondents from each of the three malls. From the defined strata, random selection was done to identify the respondents to be used for the study. Primary data was collected using a semi-structured questionnaire administered personally by the researcher. Frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviations were used to analyze data.
The findings were that most retailers perceived proximity of the shopping malls to the city center to be of little significance when deciding where to establish their business. Shopping malls are highly perceived on the security that retailers are guaranteed with their wares. This implies that retailers would prefer to operate in a shopping mall that provided a safe, convenient and attractive place for shopping than its location, number of services provided in the mall or the number of customers patronizing the malls. To a moderate extent, shopping malls are bound to be perceived on the strength of their number of services provided. It also emerged that the retailers perceived the shopping malls as being patronized by shoppers of household goods.
In order to increase turnover for those retailers not dealing in household goods, they need to develop proper advertising and promotion tools that will appeal to more customers to patronize their stores apart from relying on those visiting the malls primarily for household shopping.
Despite the findings, the study had some limitations. Some of the targeted respondents had a negative attitude towards the study. As a result, it was not possible to get the targeted figure owing to the fact that it proved difficult to convince a good number of them to participate in the research.
It was suggested that this study approached the issue of perception of shopping malls from the point of view of retailers. Another study ought to be done from the point of view of customers who patronize the different shopping malls so as to ascertain their perception of the same. | en |
