Indigenous Retailers: Merging And Expansion Against Overall Open-up To The Outside World

As a national economy grows, its retailing industry will play a role more and more important. As for China there has been a tremendous revolution taking place in its retailing market as top multinational retailers entered mainland China upon its reentering into WTO.Due to the magnitude disparity in scale, efficiency and competitiveness between the indigenous and multinational retailers, the indigenous retailers have to group up themselves against the foreign challenge. So there gives birth to a giant indigenous retailer named Shanghai Bailian Group fostered by the Shanghai Municipal Government. The new Shanghai Bailian Group is now ranking No. 1 of indigenous retailer in China. It aroused a great attention since the day it was born.But many experts doubt about the efficiency in grouping up and merging indigenous retailers to strengthen their competitiveness. It is this doubt that causes the author to carry such a case study of the Shanghai Bailian Group, so as to judge to what extent the merge is a success and what are the aspects the success reflects in. To this end the following chapters are arranged.Firstly ,through analysis of China's retailing industry, we know that its retailing industry is not matured and the competitive pattern has not been formed yet, so this is not only a challenge but also an opportunity to indigenous retailers. In terms of such an opportunity the merge can regarded as a real chance for business success.Secondly, the author makes a case study of the Shanghai Bailian Group by analyzing its motivation, process and achievements. In this way we find out that the Shanghai Bailian Group really enlarged its business sale scale and got a better competitive position in some local markets against foreign challengers after the merging. But we do not find that any efficiency and competitiveness improved. Because the merging process is so complicated, to achieve its goal the Shanghai Bailian Group still has a long way to go.Finally, combining the industry analysis and case study, the author makes a strategic appraisal for the merging of Shanghai Bailian Group, and in particular analyzes 3 aspects of achievements, i.e. growth in business scale, enhancement in efficiency and competitiveness. Then the author draws on such conclusions as : a. it is feasible for indigenous retailers to enjoy better competitiveness through merging; b. it is not a natural process for indigenous retailers from growth in business scale by merge to enhancement in efficiency and competitiveness, c. to improve competitiveness and efficiency is a hard nut to crack. Therefore we should not ask too much in such a short time.