About Crossword

Crossword Bookstores, a subsidiary of Shoppers Stop Ltd., is a chain of retail bookstores in India. It
has 96 bookstores all across the country with the latest one in Ranchi. The Ranchi bookstore, a
franchisee outlet, was opened in September, 2014 and is owned by Mr. Anand Srivastava. The bookstore
is located in Lalpur, a commercial hub of the city. Though the outlet in Ranchi does not boast of a
historical presence, Crossword is a name to reckon with for book lovers.
One of the primary goals of the store is to encourage culture of book reading and increase footfall and
sales. The manager cum owner of the store drives this objective through all his employees In order to
make the store and its operations more effective, feedback from customers, adaptation to local
requirements, interdependence of employees and owner will be essential. The store will also need to
satisfy customer needs and employees through service, rewards (monetary, non-monetary) and employee
care policies.
Organization Design
Roles and responsibilities of employees at the Crossword store were defined. A set of five employees
headed by a supervisor formed the core team at the store. Other support staff included security and
housekeeping personnel.
The employees were tasked with assisting customers in browsing of books, directing them towards
appropriate sections of the store (fiction, no-fiction, best-sellers etc.) and recommendations based on
customer requirements.
Supervisor of the store was assigned with dual responsibility of handling the team and looking into
marketing and promotional activities of the store. He acts as a point of contact for the stores association
with schools, colleges and corporate establishments.
Functional Support
The Crossword bookstore, being a small and new set up does not have distinct functions to support its
activities. A broad classification of different functions at the store would have the following:
Marketing Promotions and campaigns are handled by the supervisor. He organizes promotional events
in store, liaises with educational institutions and public libraries, facilitates sponsorship of events and
oversees advertising campaigns in print and electronic media. Recently, he was instrumental in engaging
Crossword as a sponsor of Funathon, a marathon event organized by CSR club of IIM Ranchi.
Operations (Inventory) It is managed by employees who assist customers as well as by the store
supervisors who has a dual responsibility of marketing and store operations. The employees make note
of customer requirements and notify the supervisor or owner on replenishment of stock. In addition, the
SKUs are electronically tracked which helps the management place orders. Orders are placed to an
approved list of vendors provided by the parent company

Information Systems Installation of server and enterprise software is done with the help of parent
company. It helps the store relay real time data on sale and inventory levels to Crosswords corporate
office and determines sales revenue. Thereafter, payments are made as per the revenue sharing
agreement between the franchisee store and parent company.
Administration Billing, returns and exchanges are handled by employees hired by the store. Other
administrative support such as security and housekeeping has been outsourced to an external vendor.
Company Performance
The bookstore is around six months old and therefore, financial, operational or performance related to
customer service is yet to be ascertained. The bookstore is in a phase of making its presence felt amongst
the people and imbibing culture of book reading. The management is hopeful of developing that culture
and increase sales and footfall. Overall, customer response looks positive and the store is confident of
breaking even within a year into operations