Merchandizing Practices and Sales Performance of Supermarkets in Nakuru County, Kenya

In Kenya, the challenges of sales performance are prevalent amongst the supermarkets. A declining sales performance was noted for Uchumi supermarket in its 2016 financial year leading to its poor financial performance. Nakumatt supermarket has also had poor sales performance in the recent years leading to its struggling financial position. Merchandizing is one of the aspects that can be utilized for the purposes of improving on sales performance. The purpose of the study is to determine the effect of merchandizing practices and sales performance of Supermarkets in Nakuru County, Kenya. The study seeks to examine the diverse aspects of merchandizing on sales performance and try to establish why the supermarkets are making losses and not profits on sales. The study specifically seek to determine the effect of customer attraction, product differentiation, product access and staff attributes on sales performance of Supermarkets in Nakuru town. This study used The Product Marketing Mix Theory, Customer Behaviour Theory and Impulse Buying Behaviour Theory. This study utilized descriptive research design to guide the study on data collection, analysis and presentation of findings. To obtain its data, the study will target the eight main supermarkets in Nakuru Town. The target population for the study was 590 staff comprising of management and supermarket line attendants. Nassiuma formula was used to determine the desired sample size for the study. A sample size of 86 respondents was selected. The study then use stratified sampling to select the supermarket line attendants into the study sample.  This study used structured questionnaires to obtain its data from supermarket line attendants. Validity and reliability of research questionnaire was tested by conducting a pilot study. This study used Content validity to ascertain the validity of the research questionnaires. The study used Cronbach’s Alpha test of internal consistency to test the reliability of the study questionnaires. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 22. This study used both descriptive and inferential statistics. The entire study used tables to present the findings. The study further concluded that there was a positive relationship between product differentiation aspects and sales performance of fast moving consumer goods in Nakuru town supermarkets. The item that had the highest mean score was that supermarket stocks products based on customer specification. It was also concluded that there was a positive relationship between product access and sales performance of fast moving consumer goods in Nakuru town supermarkets. The metric that had the highest mean score was that supermarket has presence of reliable product distribution channels throughout the year. In the context of staff attributes, the study concluded that there was a positive relationship between staff attributes and sales performance fast moving consumer goods in Nakuru town supermarkets. The statement that supermarket sales staff had sufficient knowledge on product specifications had the highest mean score. The study further concluded that merchandizing strategies, namely, customer attraction, product access, product differentiation and staff attributes significantly predicted the level of sales performance of fast moving consumer goods in Nakuru town supermarkets. Staff attributes had the highest influence on sales performance of fast moving consumer goods in Nakuru town supermarkets. The study will enable the top management of supermarkets in making decisions of merchandising.  This study will also help academicians in this subject area as well future researcher for the study will add to the limited literature on merchandizing strategies and sales performance.