Product/service variety strategy considering mixed distribution of human lifestyles

Managing product and service variety for a retail store is a key task to satisfy various customer needs given some constraints. Nevertheless, it is difficult to ascertain the distribution of customer demands because customers have different lifestyles and valuation bases. This paper presents a proposal of an analytical method for product and service variety using historical purchase data and a lifestyle survey. It introduces a study example of a supermarket chain in which customers’ purchase behaviors can be elucidated more clearly by categorizing customers into six lifestyle categories. Results illustrate how customer data in services are useful for manufacturing.