MANAGING A CO-OPERATIVE SHOP AS A SMALL TRADING VENTURE (A CASE STUDY OF MARKETING DEPARTMENT MINI SUPERMARKET IN I.M.T ENUGU)
ABSTRACT
This study intends to investigate the managing a co-operative shop as a small trading venture. A case study of marketing department mini supermarket (I.M.T) Enugu. Specifically, the study tends.To find out if best location of business automatically lead to effective management of co-operative shop.
To find out if incentive such as bonus, free gift, and discounts are properly introduced for attraction and retention of customers. To determine the extent of which owner managers of co-operative shop use product line and product diversification for the growth of their business. Also, in the process of executing this research work, the researcher takes adequate care to structure a simple quest once which was distributed personally to the respondent, by hand and collection was also done by hand in order to generate primary data while secondary data was gotten through the use of book, journals, magazine published by different authors. The population for this study both for the owner / managers as nine (9) stay unstapled and for member/customers to be was given by the secretary to the marketing department as part of oral interview conducted by the researcher. However, Bowrley’s formular was applied to determine the sample size of the member /customers since the population was considered too big to handle by the researcher. Therefore, total number of completed and returned questionnaires for owner/mangers is nine (9) while for member /customers is two hundred and sixty four (264).
After throughout investigation and proper analysis of data, the researcher discovered the following to be the major findings.
–Â Â Â Â Â Â Â That capital is the prime factor to be considered in establishing a co-operative shop.
–       That strategies adopted by marketing department mini         supermarket are value, efficiency and sensory   strategies.
–       That location has contributed very adequate to the      success of the venture.
–       That incentives such as bonus, free gift and discounts were not properly used for attraction and retention of      customers.
–       That product line and product diversification were not         used by this shop.
–       That most co-operate shop, fails due to mismanagement       of such venture.
However, from the findings stated above, the researcher than conclude that whoever wants to establish a co-operative shop should go ahead and do so for the fact that all the resources for effective management of the shop are put in place.
