Changing methods of location planning for retail companies

Academic research has made an enormous contribution to applied problem solving in the areas of retail planning and marketing. The aim of this paper is to review the changing methodologies used in store location research beginning with the work on simple checklist and analogue techniques in the 1960s. The arrival of geographical information systems (GIS) heralded the start of a second phase of work which eventually saw GIS established in many retail organisations. However, the main argument of this paper is the need to consider more sophisticated modelling procedures if the different types of corporate growth strategy are to be adequately investigated. This third phase of research development focuses on these models and illustrates the business potential of such approaches through a number of case studies. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.