Narsee Monjee College of Commerce and Economics

Class: T.Y.B.M.S. Div: ‘A’

Subject: Management of co-operatives

Topic: Consumer co-operatives

Sub topic: Apna Bazaar

Names: Roll No.:

Puja Chheda 19

Utsav Gandhi 35

Shivya Gupta 37

Pari Savla 52

Page 1
Acknowledgements

We would like to take this opportunity to thank NARSEE MONJEE COLLEGE OF COMMERCE AND
ECONOMICS to provide us with a platform to present this topic on consumer cooperatives. Secondly,
we would like to thank our professor PANKAJ NATU sir for guiding us through the course of the
presentation and enlightening us about the topic to be presented at every stage.

WE would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to the Manager of Apna Bazaar ( Andheri West) for
informing us about the working of their cooperative, the Reliance Fresh manager , and the various
consumers of Reliance Fresh and Apna Bazaar who spared a few precious moments to talk about their
perspectives about the same and give us a broad view.

We would also like to thank Mrs. Jyoti Chheda, Mr. Nayan Bhatia, Mrs. Deepa Vira, Mrs. Jyoti Vira,
and Mrs. Amita Bhatia to give us the information on Apna Bazaar.

Last but not the least, we would like to thank our classmates for patiently listening to the information
disseminated through our presentation , thereby cooperating with us.

Page 2
Index

Introduction

Introduction to Apna Bazaar

Needs and objectives of Apna Bazaar

Structure of Apna Bazaar

Products offered at Apna Bazaar

Features of Apna Bazaar

Sources of income

Exports

Video by Apna Bazaar Bachao samittee

Problems faced by Apna Bazaar

Future plans of Apna Bazaar

Reliance Fresh video

Recommendation

Conclusion

Page 3
CONSUMER CO-OPERATIVE SOCIETIES
Consumers are unorganized and therefore exploited by traders in price, quality and weight. Consumer
co-operatives protects the interests of consumers against artificial scarcity, over charging of prices,
supply of sub standard goods and the unfair trade practices distorted by private traders.

Definition:

Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960, defines consumer co-operative society as a society, the
object of which is:

 The procurement, production or processing and the distribution of goods to or, the performance of
other services for its members as also other consumers,

 The distribution among its members and customers, of the profit occurring from such procurement,
production, processing and distribution are in proportion as prescribed by rules or bye-laws of the
society.

A consumer co-operative society is basically formed for the promotion of the interests of the consumers.

Composition of consumer co-operative societies:

Page 4
APNA BAZAAR
Apna Bazaar is probably the oldest and largest consumer co-operative multi-state society with a
customer base of over 12 lakhs. The Rs 140-crore retail chain, that, for over 55 years remained largely
“middle-class”, Apna Bazaar has 80 outlets in Mumbai, Thane and the neighbouring Konkan region. It
has recently opened its first shop outside the state in Goa. The biggest store is at Vashi, which is spread
across 27000 sq.feet.

Apna Bazaar, the synonym for the basic needs,

Brand name of Mumbai Kamgar Madhyavarti

Grahak Sahakari Mandal Ltd

Date of Incorporation 9th May 1948

Constitution Multi State Co-operative Society
Sector Private
Industry Retailing
Registered Office 106-A, Govingi Keni Road,
Naigaon, Dadar [East], Mumbai
400014

Unknown facts:-
1.       This co.operative was started under a tree.
2.       This was the first ever co.operative store in Maharashtra.
3.       Apna bazaar just completed 6o years in may 2009.
4.       It has received 2 awards for BEST CONSUMER CO.OPERATIVE SOCIETY STORE.
5.       Apna bazaar has MULTI-STATE CONTRACT.
6.       It was started by the MILL WORKERS.
7.       APNA PARIVAR is the deciding authority.
8.       It has never entered into a controversy uptil now.
9.       There are medical check-up centres  at vashi and naigaon.

Role of Apna Bazaar:

Apna Bazaar plays a vital role by market intervention during the shortages of essential commodities.
The distribution of these items is taken up by the Apna Bazaar at a loss to fulfill its social commitments.
At times of need, Apna Bazaar has diverted its manpower and resources, even at the cost of its own
commercial interest, for the public good.

Objectives of Apna Bazaar:

Page 5
 To undertake wholesale and retail distribution of consumer goods and essential commodities; and to
establish department stores;
 To foster the growth products and new manufacturing units through market support and management
advice
 To lower distribution costs and to introduce fair and better trading practices such as fixed prices etc;
and
 Eradication of malpractices of traders black marketing, artificial scarcity, cheating in measurements,
adulteration, etc.
 Necessity of time – public distribution of essential commodities in rural and urban areas.
 Elimination of middlemen.

Facilities Offered By Apna Bazaar to Consumers:

Apna Bazaar provides the following facilities to consumers: -

 Quality products at reasonable prices.
 Variety of items under one roof.
 24 hours drugs outlets.
 Self-service counters
 Items of high quality tested by its quality- testing laboratory.
 Display boards and price lists at various counters to enable the customer to make his/her choice.
 Home delivery, but this facility is only available for purchase from branches.
 Discount sales periodically on various items

Management and Organization:

Apna Bazaar is headed by a management team comprising a chairman, vice chairman and Hon
secretaries. The team largely provides direction to the organization and is not involved in the day-to-day
affairs. The day-to-day affairs are managed by an executive team, which consists of a general manager,
additional general manager and office bearers of the organization.

The structure:-
 
Apna bazaar is mainly governed by the shareholders. They are the main and important people in the
administration of the store. The shareholders elect 2o members who are competent enough to carry out
the various activities. The 20 elected members in turn elect the 4 secretaries. The secretaries supervise
the managers of each department and the employees directly report to the assistant manager. All the
employees at apna bazaar are provided training for 6 months at THE ASHOK MEHTA INSTITUTE,
VASHI.

Page 6
Items Sold By Apna Bazaar

Apna Bazaar has the following three main categories of items:

a. Agro products
b. Branded products
c. Rural products
Apna Bazaar sells an immense variety of items through its various departments/retail outlets. These are
described below: -

 Furniture:
All type of wooden furniture, steel furniture library furniture, hospital furniture, revolving chairs,
computer furniture, mattresses, pillows, sofa cushion.

 Household:
Steel utensils, aluminum utensils, non stock, gas stoves, locks, mixer-grinder, juice-cum-mixer grinder,
hot-cases, room heater, room convector, geysers, all type of fans, electrical goods, washing machine, air-
conditioners, water cooler, voltage stabilizer, generator set, crockery, flasks, plastic items, electrical
bulb/tubes and tube fittings, table lamp, emergency light, cell, torch, electric wire, desert cooler, exhaust
fans.

 Footwear:

Page 7
Shoes, sandals, ladies purse, belt, umbrella, school, bag, suit cases, brief cases, file box, file bag,
luggage bag.

 Textile:
Woolen suiting, tericot suiting and shirting, blanket, blazer, bed-sheets, pillow cover, dress material, all
types of sarees, markein cloth, long cloth, voil, mulmul khadi etc.

 Handloom:
Towels, dusters, curtain cloth, bed-covers, carpets, quilt, durries, jute matting, blankets, pillow covers,
door-mats, PVC flooring.

 Ready Made Garments:

Pants, shirts, undergarments, socks, sweaters, leather jackets, ladies suits, petticoats, children garments,
rain coats, over-coats, mosquito mat, curtain tapes, machine oil, raxine.

 Stationery:
All types of duplicating, typing, photocopies paper, printing paper, all types of rules registers in different
sizes peon books, dak pads, pens, pencils, pen stands, eraser, markers, sign pens, gum-bottles scales,
colours, art material, sealing wax, white fluid, sutle, stencil and carbon paper, all type of computer
stationery, butter paper, crepe paper, glaze paper, graph paper, file covers, log books, all type of printed
forms (Govt. offices), PVC sheet for binding purposes, transparency sheets, ledgers, cash books
calculators, computer floppy, fax roll, typewriting ribbon, ammonia paper rolls.

 Watches:
Watches of reputed companies like Titan.

 Grocery & Toiletries:

Pulses, spices, atta, rice, oils, tea leaves, and various other edible items, insecticides, disinfectants,
phenyle, detergents, soaps, cosmetics, tissue rolls and napkins etc.

 Medical & Surgical Equipment:

All types of medicines, medical & surgical equipment etc.

Target segments:

The store was started keeping in mind the lower middle class section of the society. But gradually it has
moved up the consumer ladder with the inclusion of the middle class as its target consumer. Now slowly
it is drawing the upper class towards it. It now caters to almost all the segments of the society depending
on the location. In order to attract the upper class & to combat growing competition in the retail industry
it is making changes in its product-mix.

Page 8
Apna Club:

Apna Club is a service organization. It is registered under society or club registration. Monthly/annual
memberships are available in this. Membership is Rs. 100 for month and Rs.500 for year and Rs. 5,000
for lifetime in cities(corporations).

It is Rs.50 for month, Rs 250 for year, Rs.2500 for life time in municipalities and District head quarteRs
It is Rs. 25 for month, and 100 for year and 1,000 for life time in Major Grama Panchayithies.

All services are available without any extra charges for the club membeRs Sometimes one month
membership is taken by the consumer if he require only one service. Kitty Party is arranged for the
women belong to the club members family and recreation is provided for very nominal charges. The
expenditure of the party is covered in the nominal charges collected from the membeRs The remaining
amount is awarded to few women by lottery. New entries to the markets, and women related goods are
exhibited and sold in that Kitty party.

Picnic is arranged for Apna Club members every three months once by collecting reasonable charges
from them. And Pasture parties are arranged yearly once for the club membeRs Meetings and gatherings
are arranged periodically to develop more aquintance in Spiritual, funny, worldly and legal related goods
and services. Cultural activities, games, singing competitions are conducted on national holidays.

Maximum discounts are offered to the club members in Apna BazaaRs Discounts are also offered from
the companies, restaurants, and hundreds of shops which are associated to the Apna Bazaar. Services
from the national and international clubs are also provided for the club members.

Half of the amount from the membership fee is paid to franchise.

Lacks of families obtain the membership from Apna club and develop their relation with it and stick to it
for lifetime for the needs of their goods and services

Page 9
Features of Apna Bazaar(Andheri):

The board displays the names of the committee members.

Apna Bazaar Masala, Pickles and Papad . These are the only products
which are manufactured by Apna Bazaar themselves.

Page
10
 The Apna Bazaar all time Drug Store.

The Facility by western union money transfer to exchange currency.

Apna Bazaar helps in Women employment.

Page
11
 This pictures shows that AB is also into apparels.

Facility for speedy cash counter for items below 5

The prices of products are lower than the M.R.P.

Page
12
 Label showing the Product name, Price,
Manufacturing date, Expiry date n all details.

One of the promotional schemes going on in AB

Donation Boxes kept at the cash counters.

Sources of income: ATM and Giving Space to private players.

Page
13
Page
14
Sources of Income:

 Retailing is their core activity and a major part of their income come from the various retail outlets.
 They supply commodities like Dal, Pulses, Food grains, Cereals to Govt. Institutions, Hospitals for
their Canteens. A 30 Days credit is given to them.
 They also earn income from the company racks that they display in their outlets. These racks contain
the products of the particular company and the in turn pays Apna Bazaar for displaying these racks.
E.g. Maggie, Colgate, Pepsodent, Vicks, Nescafe etc.
 They provide space to companies e.g. MEPL (Electronic goods) in order to display and sell their
goods by charging rent for space provided.
 They have 37 Franchise outlets, which act as a source of income for Apna Bazaar as Apna Bazaar
supplies 70% of goods.
 Provide place to banks for opening ATM center by charging rent since almost all the outlets are
owned by Apna Bazaar.

 MetLife India signed an agreement with Apna Bazaar Co-operative for selling life insurance
policies. Based on the agreement, Apna Bazaar Co-operative shall become corporate agents for
MetLife India and offer MetLife India products to its huge customer base. Henceforth Apna Bazaar
will enable its customers to build financial freedom through MetLife India products based on need
analysis. Apna Bazaar will receive a commission of 35% on Premium amount.

Exports:

'Apna Bazaar ' is a 55 year old co-operative organization with US $ 37 million annual turnover through
07 departmental stores, 06 super markets & 65 retail outlets.
Apna Bazaar used to export commodities like fish and grapes to Europe. In spite of good earnings on
exports they have discontinued the exports from this year .Thus the reasons for the discontinuation were
due to:

 The goods were seasonal in nature.

 In case of grapes the Jalgoan region in which grapes where cultivated was hit by drought, thereby by
affecting the production of grapes.
 Besides the grapes were sprayed with certain chemicals which were banned in the
European countries, thereby further affecting the exports.
 Besides exports is not Apna Bazaar’s core activity therefore the decision to discontinue exports was
taken.

Page
15
Apna Bazaar Bachao Samittee video:

In this video we have Mr. Ashok Dadvi the Head of the Apna Bazaar Bachao Samittee talks about the
current problem faced by the Apna Bazaar.

The first half of the video talks about the History about How Apna Bazaar was established.

The purpose of this video is that the current status of the Apna Bazaar is very bad. They are not able to
pay their daily wage employees. Thus it’s a troublesome problem.

One of the cause to the problem is as below:

Cause: The managing committee as of now is a lot under political pressure. Their role to take decisions
that would be beneficial to the consumers are overshadowed by the political pressure and altered
according to their benefits. They are being guided under someone else.

One of the decisions to prove about the political pressure is: The property owned by Apna Bazaar near
Naigoan which is around 23,000 sq.ft. was sold at mere price of 60 lakhs which is worth in crores as on
now.

The decision was taken by the chairman Mr. Narmane and he left the decision power to sell n decide for
it to someone else outside the managing committee.

COMPETITION FROM COMMERCIAL DEPARTMENTAL STORES:

To take into account the differences in consumer perspectives, we interviewed a consumer at

RELIANCE FRESH and the following were her views:

As per her experience, RELIANCE FRESH was a better option and enjoyed more consumer satisfaction
over a cooperative like Apna Bazaar because of the following reasons:

1. Better service at Reliance fresh.(Salesman are better communicators)

2. Vegetables are fresh and hygienic at Reliance fresh unlike a cooperative.
3. Air conditioned and better ambience.
4. Overall better customer delight and satisfaction

So we can conclude, that consumer perspectives differ from person to person and Apna Bazaar still
lacks in some areas and has a few drawbacks which it has to overcome to face stiff competition from
commercial cooperatives and convert the above customers into their consumers.

Page
16
Problems:

1. Theft / Shoplifting: The Apna Bazaar stores are large in size. Therefore, it is difficult to keep a check on
the customers. Also the lack of any security gadgets makes it more tedious for the staff to notice any
malpractices that might be occurring on the premises. Thus, thefts occur at least 2 – 3 times a month.
Defaulters are charged a fine of Rs. 501.
2. Lack of Personal Attention: Apna Bazaar stores a large number of commodities and has around 2500 –
3000 customers visiting it daily. Thus it is almost impossible for the staff to give personal attention to the
customers.
3. Electronic Items Turnover: While buying an electronic appliance, a customer wants a guarantee for it in
the form of an After – Sales Service Contract and a Warranty. The absence of such provisions results in a
low turnover of electronic items, compared to other stores. This could also be due to the brand image of
Apna Bazaar.
4. Store Layout: Over the years, Apna Bazaar has strived to become a one stop – shop for its customers by
storing all commodities from Fast Moving Consumer Goods to utensils to electronic items and also seasonal
products like mangoes and Ganpati idols. Due to this the store has become very crammed and there is no
proper layout followed throughout.
5. Ration Restrictions: This has led to a fall on the net profits of Apna Bazaar Ration Shops. The introduction
of 3 tier cards led to a cut in the quota.
6. Mini - Bus Facility: Apna Bazaar has limited funds. Thus due to high petrol prices, this facility had to be
stopped in 3 places in Mumbai which led to a reduction in profits to the tune of Rs. 3 crores.

Future Plans:

 Apna Bazaar plans to open outlets in the new housing colonies coming up in the interior suburbs like
Kandivli and Thane.

 Increasing the distribution reach is a strategy to counter competition the co-operative plans to
increase its outlets from 80 at present to about 100 by next year. This would comprise department
stores, super markets, franchisee outlets and medical stores, both in Maharashtra as well as rest of
the country.

 Apart from that, it has money transfer facility under an arrangement with Western Union money
transfer.

 On the tie-up with HPCL for having Apna Bazaar outlets at the petrol pumps, so far three HPCL
pumps have Apna Bazaar outlets and the results are still being analyzed.

 Apna Bazaar Co-operative has embarked on a restructuring exercise and has appointed Darashaw
and Company as strategic consultants. The restructuring involves exiting certain business while

Page
17
 adding more services, to be provided under its umbrella. The restructuring plan involves exiting out
of businesses like export of fish and grapes, milk processing, manufacturing bakery products like
biscuits and also pickles papads and spices.

 Online booking for provisions through the Net and a centralized system to control inventory are also
on the anvil. To begin with the co-operative plans to have a dedicated call center for customers to
phone in their requirements, which would then be delivered from the nearest Apna Bazaar outlet. An
online presence, on the lines of Sangam Direct-the online initiative of HLL-is under consideration.

 To ensure minimum inventory and maximum rotation, the co-operative is planning to centralize its
supply chain management. It is talking to FMCG majors like Tata, Nestle, HLL and P&G to ensure
rotation without building up much inventory. While the super markets would be serviced directly by
the companies, the requirements of franchisee outlets would be met by Apna Bazaar to ensure better
co-ordination.

 Apna Bazaar operates the Akshay Labh Yojana scheme wherein the customers can deposit Rs.
10,000 at any point of time in the year and get items worth Rs. 100 per month free. They also have
term deposit schemes.

 Apna Bazaar has also entered into an eCRM tie-up with Venture Infotek, the e-infrastructure
solutions provider, whereby Venture Infotek provides the integrated end-to-end solutions, with the
shared infrastructure and payment-as-you-use payment mechanism, without investment in
infrastructure.

 The first thing on Apna Bazaar’s plans is to work on all 365 days like other big players.
 Upgrading the skills of their manpower and create vehicle parking facility are also in their agenda.
They plan to have a tie-up with Citibank on co-branding. Regarding credit card, they are on the
verge of signing a MoU with SBI. As visual merchandising, a new way for presenting the products
will be introduced.

 The National Consumers Co-Operative Federation has approached Apna Bazaar and enquired about
the possibility of running department stores under the brand name Apna Bazaar in Delhi and
Madhya Pradesh.

 Apna Bazaar is planning to open another outlet in Goa as they have got a good response from the
supermarket.

Recommendations:

 Government interference has had a major effect on the democratic setup of Apna Bazaar. Therefore,
lesser dependence on government should be opted for.

Page
18
 Government should help stores like Apna Bazaar with credit at cheaper interest rates.

 Apna Bazaar should improve their capital assets by enrolling more members and also introduce more
product varieties.

 In the coming years, the economy will be dominated by the retailing sector. Times are changing,
organizations are changing. Changing according to times is inevitable. Apna Bazaar has to change its
traditional viewpoints. It should adopt new techniques and accept change wholeheartedly. Bringing
qualitative changes in their skill and especially mindset will help it to survive competition.

 Apna Bazaar can open one outlet offering all the products it sells in the 80 outlets so that people get
all products offered by Apna Bazaar under one roof.

Other activities:

 Healthy child competition for member children.

 Ayurvedic camp conducted by Apna Bazaar every year in November.
 Consumer bulletins are printed and distributed to consumers, which gives them information about various
products stored by them.

Page
19
Bibliography:

www.google.com
www.apnabazar.com
www.wikipedia.com

Visit to Andheri Apna Bazaar

Page
20