Elektra survey

With six decades of presence in the market, experience in granting loans and an incomparable collecting system, Grupo Elektra is the leading company in financial services and specialized trade in Latin America.
It was founded in 1950, by Hugo Salinas Rocha, to be a company dedicated in manufacturing radio transmitters. However, in 1957, it started operating in a different way. It opened itsfirst three Elektra stores and with them, began making its way to become number one in the retail business.
Grupo Elektra is composed by a financial and a commercial unit. The group currently serves the financial services through Banco Azteca, Seguros Azteca and Afore Azteca, while the commercial sector is served by Elektra and Salinas y Rocha.
The target market of Elektra is the base of thesocial pyramid. The company offers its products and services to people that could be classified in the D+ (monthly income between 5,500 and 8,990 pesos) and C (monthly income between 9,000 and 26,990 pesos) classes. In order to reach this specific segment of the market, the group places its Elektra stores in strategic locations in which the lower-middle class of the population have access to them.People enjoy window shopping and Elektra knows it. For this reason, in the store’s windows are displayed “Trigger” products (innovative, high-tech and with special promotions) that catches the customers attention. For example, in one Elektra store, in its window there is a sound system displayed with a tag that contains the system’s characteristics and its payment plan. The payment plan consists ofthe price of the product, the weekly payments in case of a credit purchase, “pago puntual” (quantity that the customer pays before the established day of payment) and the saved amount by paying in advanced. All of these payment facilities attract the customers who go inside the store and make a purchase.
Over the years, Grupo Elektra has been concerned in finding ways to provide more and betterservices for its customers. To achieve this, the group has implemented several strategies.
The group knows that the success of its operations and sales depends on the service that its employees provide the customers. This is why, the company makes the preparation, training and certification of its workforce, its number one priority.
Every employee in the company is given a description of itsresponsibilities and a constant training in order for them to develop the abilities and expertise necessaries to do the job. The online University of Elektra gives, to the company’s employees, all the courses that allow them to be certified in the job they do, as well as the updates of these courses. The new employees receive an initiation program and online training. The company’s operativemanagers receive four weeks of training, theoretical and practical, in managerial topics, of products and services, systems and administration.
In order to serve the base of the social pyramid, Elektra has developed a credit approval program with its own database. By implementing this strategy, the customers feel that the store trust them since it gives them the chance to buy products just by making aweekly payment of no more than 100 pesos. This represents a great opportunity for these people since the payment does not exceed the 20% of its total income.
Since, Grupo Elektra has experience in providing consumer credits in the low income sector of the population (70% of Mexico’s population), another strategy that the group decided to implement was founding Banco Azteca in the year 2002. Withthe purpose of serving its target market, Banco Azteca grants consumer credits to people that normally cannot get one, due to all the restraints and limitations that the financial institutions impose.
Grupo Elektra also uses the colors of its stores as a strategy. Elektra stores are painted in yellow with its name in red. The sign of the store is visible to over 100 meter away. Human beings are...