Comparisons between two retail organizations namely JC Penney and Kohls - Research Paper Example

Furthermore, the state of New York has been chosen as a base location for comparison between these two organizations. One store from each organization has been chosen for contrasting between the retailers. ABOUT JC PENNEY AND KOHL’S The business of JC Penney comprises selling various products like apparel, shoes, accessories, jewelry, beauty items and home decoration products along with delivering different services such as salon, photography and decorating among others to the customers by its departmental stores.

Since the foundation of the organization, JC Penney has grown to about 1104 departmental stores in 49 states of the US (JCP Media Inc., “J. C. Penney Company, Inc.”). On the other hand, Kohl’s also provide apparel, footwear, accessories, home products and house wares among others. By the end of the year 2012, Kohl’s has nearly 1146 stores in the entire US region (Kohl's Illinois, Inc., “Kohl’s Corporation”). SHOPPING ITEMS The shopping list on which the comparison will be made comprise rings from jewelry and watches category, bath towels from bed and bath category, bedroom furniture from furniture category, women dresses from women category and men athletic shoes from shoes category.

Appendix 1 would show the list of the selected items along with price range and average price (JCP Media Inc., “Free Shipping Everyday”; Kohl's Illinois, Inc., “Kohl’s Expect Great Things”). . In this context, it can be viewed that JC Penney and Kohl’s have considerable number of stores in New York City. With respect to JC Penney, the closest store is located at Serramonte Center with distance of 8.9 miles from the city, hence this store has been chosen for the study (JCP Media Inc.

, “Find A Store”) Concerning Kohl’s, closest mall is Jersey City Mall which is situated at distance of 2.64 miles from the New York City and has been selected for the analysis (Kohl's Illinois, Inc., “Store”). Customer Service: With respect to customer services, it can be apparently observed that the services of Kohl’s are superior to JC Penny. The stores of Kohl’s are opened longer then JC Penney i.e. in weekdays, the stores of Kohl’s are opened from 8 am to 10 pm, whereas the stores of JC Penney are opened from 10 am to 9.30 pm. In Sunday also, the stores of Kohl’s remain open for longer hours than JC Penney.

On the other hand, it can also be observed that it takes much time to talk with the customer service representatives in JC Penney than Kohl’s. However, in JC Penney, the employees are quite able to handle customer service related issues with courtesy and competence. On the other hand, employees of Kohl’s are able to provide support in understanding the cause of any kind regarding customer related issues and provide solutions to the problems. The employees of JC Penney also possess strong knowledge about product features than the employees of Kohl’s (JCP Media Inc.

, “Find A Store”; Kohl's Illinois, Inc., “Store”). Store Layout: The store layout of JC Penney is concentrated on representing a streamlined visual display for the customers. JC Penney restricts the number of displays in the stores and it replaces the inventory