Growth of Retail Sector & Demand of Retail Analyst Professional

After the independence from the British rule, India had prevented innovation and organised competition in its consumer retail market to protect its small scale industries. Several studies claim that the lack of infrastructure and competitive retail industry was the key cause of India's persistently high inflation but after the 2011, retail reforms (Approval of FDI) in India there is a gradual growth in retail sector and a number of supermarket chain opening their outlets.

                                                          Fig: Suparmarket Store

A lot of investors are pouring their money in the fastest growing market of the world, there are a lot of expected growths in the retail sector as the 75% household items now are sold by family business owner and they have the full control on it. It shows there is a future in retail market.
The growing business means growing large data, to handle this complex data set there is a need of high number of qualified professional who have the knowledge about the Business Intelligence (BI) as well as the technical specialty to handle them.

Challenges & Opportunity for Retail Analyst Professional

Total retail employment in India, both in organised and unorganized sector account for about 6% of Indian labour work force currently - mostly of it is unorganised .This about a third of levels in United States and other developed nation; and about half of levels in other emerging economic nation. A complete expansion of retail sector to levels and productivity similar to other emerging economies and developed economies such as the United States would create over 50 million jobs in India. Training and development of labour and management for higher retail productivity is expected to be a challenge.

Responsibilities of Retail Analyst

Trend analysis: Analysis responsibilities include monitoring store category sales, supervising physical inventory, identifying trends, and monitoring the timing and scope of seasonal changes. Analysts are responsible for keeping a big picture view of trends for the entire chain, and the flow of merchandise both in and out of the retail supply chain.

Cash-Flow: Cash flow is the money that is moving (flowing) in and out of your business in a month. Although it does seem sometimes that cash flow only goes one way - out of the business - it does flow both ways.
Cash is coming in from customers or clients who are buying your products or services. If customers don't pay at the time of purchase, some of your cash flow is coming from collections of accounts receivable.

Cash is going out of your business in the form of payments for expenses, like rent or a mortgage, in monthly loan payments, and in payments for taxes and other accounts payable.

Profit margin: In retail, the Gross Margin Percent is recognized as the Contribution Margin Percent. The contribution margin information can be used to add or remove products and product lines or to make informed pricing decisions.
                          Contribution Margin = Sales - Variable Costs 
Inventory Allocation: Allocation responsibilities include maintaining desired inventory levels and assortments, scheduling deliveries, and overseeing shipping/receiving and warehousing of merchandise. Working directly with suppliers, merchandising analysts develop supply strategies that will minimize stockpile while maximizing inventory turns.
Promotion Effectiveness Analysis: The objective of promotional analysis is to help a retailer understand the impact of past promotions and hence formulate future strategies which could be applied and adapted to produce profitable results of their business analysts checks whether the promotion targets new customers or not, what is the repurchase history, what is the shift from competitor brand/product.