Measuring Effectiveness of Distribution Channel Practices among Merchants: An Empirical Study on Logistics Companies in Chennai City

The Indian logistics industry is defined by its ability to function as an integral service to the customers in helping them ameliorate their overhead costs in the logistics sector in India. The logistics market in India comprises shipping, port-services, warehousing, rail, road and air freight, express cargo and other value-added services. The logistics sector in India supports various components of the manufacturing industry in India. Over 50% of the logistical requirements are outsourced by the top logistics companies in India. Transport is a crucial component of the Indian logistics industry, being about half the size of the Indian logistics industry market size, followed by warehousing and storage, comprising another 25–30% of the total market. The rest of the Indian logistics industry market size constitutes value-added and freight forwarding services. Road transportation with over 50% market share dominates the logistics industry in India, succeeded by the railway's sector at over 30%, water transport at 7%, and air shipment at 1%. The industry has moved from being just a service provider to provider of end-to-end supply chain solutions to their customers. A distribution channel is the path by which all goods and services must travel to arrive at the intended consumer. It is also used to describe the pathway that payments make from the end consumer to the original vendor. Distribution channels can be short or long, and depend on the amount of intermediaries required to deliver a product or service. The objective of research paper is to study the performance of the channel of marketing and to measure the effectiveness of distribution channel practices among merchants by the logistics services providers in Chennai city.