The Role of Royalty Card Program in Improving Repurchasing Intention of Central Department Stores

The Role of Royalty Card Program in Improving Repurchasing

Intention of Central Department Stores

Introduction

The current economic situation is affecting the shopping behavior of consumers to change. The decision to purchase would delay if it is not urgently needed. This makes the marketers of Retail Corporations to adapt their marketing campaign all the time in order to capture the customers and market trends' direction.

Many companies have to change to be customer oriented in this increasingly competitive environment like nowadays (Kotler, 1997). Especially in this period of economic uncertainty, instead of attracting new customers, major retail department stores such as Central and The Mall Group have emphasized on launching new loyalty marketing programs to encourage current shoppers. The costs of attracting new customers are very high. To attract new customers, a company needs to pay a lot of money on advertising, a list of potential customers and hiring a super star to up the profile of the company. A customer loyalty program is brought to use as a key initiative to maintain the current customers. It not only aims to stimulate current customers to continue buying the company's products or services more frequently and more quantities, but also to prevent customers from changing to buy competitors' product.

Over the past few years, these retailer corporations have launch loyalty card program as a tool to complete with their competitor. These loyalty cards involve the personal information and a profile of point collecting for every purchase of customer. The purchasing habits of the customers will be updated every time they make a purchase. The information from these loyalty cards can be useful in analyzing marketing trends and customer purchasing behavior. So the loyalty card seems to be a good choice as a tool to enhance CRM of the retail department store.

Statement of Research Problem

The purpose of research paper is to aim to study the role of loyalty card program in order to improve customer satisfaction and customers' repurchase intention toward Central department stores.

Company Profile

The Central Department Stores and Central Retail Corporation have been established for 62 years. Its annual sales revenue is more than 1.5 billion US dollars per year. The company has more than 30,000 employees. Central Retail currently operates and wholly owns more than 200 stores in various sizes and formats throughout Thailand.

Central Retail Corporation is comprised of:

Department Stores - Central Department Store

- Robinson Department Store

- Zen Department Store

Specialty Stores - Top Marketplace

- Power Buy

- B2S

- HomeWorks

- Office Depot

- Super Sport

Joint Venture - Big C Super center

- Watson's

- Marks & Spencer

Online Business - Central Online

Central Department Store has been recognized to be an excellent retailer in Thailand for more than 6 decades. Many survey of shoppers show that Central is the number one of favorite department store of Thai people. Moreover, it also has the highest sales revenue comparing to other department stores in Thailand.

With its affluence and prosperity, Central supplies to all Thai's urban population, including expatriates and tourists. Not only expanding branches in Bangkok, Central expands other four branches in large provincial area which are Chiang Mai, Hadyai, Phuket Island, and Pattaya Beach. Both local and international reputations of Central Department Store are commitment on trading selection, exciting visual presentation, great atmosphere and environment, and impressive services. Central has been honoring by many Alliances with many honor awards. In 2003, the United States of the best house honored Central ware merchandising in the Asia-Pacific region and gave the Global Innovator Award to the company.

Asia's Top 1,000 Brands Report by Media Portfolio ranked Central Department Store to be 175 out of the 1,000 brands that were surveyed in September 2006. In the department store category, the Central Department Store is voted to be the second on the rank following the number 1 Sogo of