Retail Theory and Practice: A Case Study of Primark in the UK

RUNNING HEAD: RETAIL THEORY AND PRACTICE
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Retail Theory and Practice
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Retail Theory and Practice
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Retail............................................................................................................................................3
Company......................................................................................................................................3
Changes in Macro environment of UK fashion retail......................................................................4
Political Factors............................................................................................................................4
Economic Factors.........................................................................................................................4
Social Factors...............................................................................................................................5
Technological Factors..................................................................................................................5
Environmental Factors.................................................................................................................5
Legal Factors................................................................................................................................5
Changes in Micro environment.......................................................................................................6
Strategies and Tactics......................................................................................................................6
Recommendations............................................................................................................................8
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................9
References......................................................................................................................................10

Retail Theory and Practice
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Introduction
Retail
Retail is considered as the process of selling services and goods to the consumers by using
different mode of distribution in order to earn profits. The term “retailer” refers to the service
providers that take the order in small quantity from large number of people who are end users of
the product or service (Lange et.al, 2018). The fashion retailing is considered as the “business of
buying clothes from manufacturers and selling them to customers”. Fashion retail includes
buying from the wholesalers, manufacturers and selling apparel, accessories and clothing to
customers (Petermans and Kent, 2016). To further get insight on the retail industry a company is
chosen named “Primark”.
Company
Primark is a fashion retailer founded in 1969 by Arthur Ryan in Dublin, and currently offers
range of products that include menswear, women wear, accessories, beauty products, footwear
and home wear in mainly the UK, America and Europe through its 350 stores. The company
expanded in the UK by acquiring Littlewoods Germany stores for £409m and after that company
expanded to Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, and Poland. Primark largest store opened in
Birmingham in 2019 (Primark, 2019).
The main competitors of the brand in the fashion retailer are M&S, New look, Next, Lesara and
Select. The company is successful and a giant international fashion retailer because of its price
strategy. In 2018, Primark captured 6.9 percent market share in the clothing industry in the UK
and its competitors M&S remained on first with 8.1 percent market share and Next with 7.1
percent of market share in fashion industry of UK (Butler, 2018).
The retail fashion industry is shifting towards the online platform and many big players in the
market are closing their retail stores. In 2018, online sales in the UK rose by 13.6 percent and
due to that “high street stores suffered a 6.1 percent slump”. Primark is the one fashion retailer
who does not offer online products; the company’s strong performance in the market changed the
trend of online shopping in the UK. Primark influenced its consumers to buy from their stores