Performance of supermarkets in Santa Catarina: an analysis of small and medium-sized units

Abstract: The retail supermarket sector is one of the most important in the third sector. Besides being one of that most generates direct and indirect jobs, it is one of the first to capture changes in consumer behavior. Given the strong competition and constant evolution of the sector, it is necessary to improve techniques for individual performance measurement of the networks and the construction of parameters of relative comparison between the units. The aim of this article is to analyze the efficiency of a 31 supermarkets sample in Santa Catarina, using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). The variables used in the investigation were gross sales, the number of employees, sales area and number of checkout's in the period of 2014 and 2015. The results pointed out a low percentage of units at maximum efficiency for the two periods analyzed. Another relevant finding was that the variables that presented a mismatch to reach the maximum efficiency of the units was the “Sales area (m2)” and “number of employees“, suggesting the existence of idle structure capacity.