Introduction

Music retail industry

The music industry in the world is one of the fastest growing segments of the world economy.
The total revenue from the music and movies and the related products have crossed the $350
billion in the year 2008 with a very impressive growth. With such a vast and fast growing
industry all the major player likes the apple with iTunes, Amazon, HMV have entered the retail
music industry. In India the organized music industry began to flourish in the mid 90s with the
entry of many big business houses.

Planet m

Planet M is an Indian music retail store originally founded by The Times Group (BCCL). It was
sold to Videocon group in Nov 2007. It is present in many cities (265 -plus locations) all over
India.

The Planet M stores are mainly known for selling music and movies and related accessories.
They also sell gaming consoles like PlayStation Portable, PS2, PS3 and Xbox360. Planet M is
also a new entrant for the Mobile retail, offering a wide range of mobile handsets with lucrative
schemes.

Planet M, which was launched in 1999, has over 5.5 million annual walk-ins across its stores
spanning 42 cities. The retail chain has a conversion rate of close to 40% and has been
experiencing a compounded annual growth rate of 33% over the past four years, a release said.
Planet M has 265 outlets across the country with 124 own stores and 131 satellite outlets.

Currently, Planet M has over 250 stores across India, of which 50 are flagship stores (over 2,000
sq ft each), 25 are `super stores’ (1,000 to 1,500 sq ft each) and the remaining neighborhood
stores (400 to 500 sq ft each).
Locations.

Planet M is present in following cities an d has the future plans to expand the business into more
small cities and towns:

Pune, Bangalore, Mangalore, Mysore, Hyderabad, Vijaywada, Vishakhapatnam, Chennai,

Tirupati, Mumbai, Thane, Vashi, Nerul, Nagpur, Nashik, Indore, Aurangabad, Ahmedabad,
New Delhi, Ghaziabad, Noida, Faridabad, Gurgaon, Lucknow, Allahabad, Varanasi, Agra,
Dehradun, Kanpur, Jaipur, Jamshedpur, Chandigarh, Mohali, Patiala, Ludhiana, Jalandhar,
Jammu, Kolkata, Tinsukia, Shillong, Bhubaneswar, Guwahati, Mussourie, Patna, Kochi,
Barrackpore, Barasat, Thiruvananthapuram.

Product line of planet m

The retail chain planet m is basically engaged in four type of product line of different type. Their
core business was basically the music retailing as an organized player but with the new
opportunities coming out, they have diversified into other product lines which are of four type-

• Music retailing

• Mobile and accessories retailing.

• Gaming and gaming products and accessories

• Gift, greeting items and apparels

• The operation of the retail chain

• The planet m is founded by the times group as a music retail outlet. The chain was a
wholly owned entity of the times group. It is basically engaged in the music retailing and
movies retailing in the physical stores. After the takeover of the company by another
retail chain Next in the year 2007, the company is still maintained as an independent
entity sticking to the core business of music retailing. Over the years, the retail chain has
enlarged the span of its operation and now it has also ventured in to the other retail
 sectors like the mobile phone, games and the other gift and apparel item retailers. In
addition to the physical shops in all the metros and the tier ii cities, they have also
launched the online retail shop under the same brand name. The customers can download
music, games, movies or they can purchase the products on display through the e-
payment system.

• The planet m is basically a multi brand retail chain displaying products of different
brands. In the music segment it offers music from all the leading music producing houses
in India as well as the western music companies. They also offer movies of all the leading
producing houses in India and the western producing houses.

• The mobile phone retail business is another important part of the retailing business of the
planetM brand. in this segment all the major mobile phone brands are sold in the retail
outlets. More over the other mobile accessories and the gaming devices are also available
in the retail shops.

• The other part of their business is the gift items and apparels. In this case they source the
products from the contract manufacturers and sell them under their brand name. in case
of the games or the mobile contents that are available in the online stores and the retail
outlets, these are mostly third party applications and planet M is basically engaged in the
marketing of these applications.

• Planet m has a very good presence in all the metros and the important cities through their
retail chains. It operates both the wholly owned retail shops as well as the franchises in
the market. In the big cities and the metros they have their wholly owned retail outlets
called as the planetM music stores with the floor area of 1500-2000 sq feet. These are
manned by the employees of the planetM. But in other tier II and tier III cities, they have
franchises outlets. These are called the music outlets of the planetM. The product range
depends upon the location as well as the demand of the products in particular outlets.
Marketing strategies of planet m

• Celebrity endorsement is one of the focuses in the planetM retail shops. The retail brands
hosts many celebrities in the media campaign. Music releases of many of the newly
released movies are organized at the selective planetM retail shops. Shahid kapoor,
Hrithik Roshan, Abheshak Bacchan are the regular visitors at the retail outlets of
planetM. By this type of marketing, the company is also gaining the media focus and
the market exposure.

• The locations of the stores are in such places where there is more crowds of the young
people and the teenagers.

• The ambience and the interior of the retail shops are also organized in such a manner to
attract the youth and the teens. More over there are music playing ports where the
customers can listen to the music prior to the purchase.

• Another very popular marketing strategy adopted by planetM in all the retail shops is the
discounts and sales. They offer discounts and sales in their product to attract the
customers. Moreover there are always surprise gifts and goodies with the purchase to
encourage the customers.

• The wide range of the product offerings available in the retail outlets of another factor of
attracting more and more customers. For example, in the music segment they have a
collection of more than 4.5 million songs of different language and 20000 albums. They
provide options to the customers in 17 different Indian languages to cater to all cultures
of the Indian society.

• The pricing of the products in the planetM retail shops are very competitive compare to
the others. Along with the discounts and the value added services, this combination
offers the customer a very good shopping option.

Conclusion
The Indian entertainment industry is growing very fast with the acceptance of the Indian
music and the movies in the west and middle east. With this developments the industry has a
very good prospect to increase its size and the market penetration. The organized music and
entertainment industry is also bound to grow with the boom in the music industry. The
addition of the new retailers and the competition between them has spiced up the market
resulting it improvement in the product offerings and customer service.

The planetm holds a very strong ground in the organized music retailing. But with the
changing market situation and competition, it has to come up with new and innovative
product offerings to attract the customers and to retain the market leader position.