Parking Space Dilemma at Express Mall
Synopsis
This caselet is used to teach students/participants the basic concepts of statistics, such as measures of central tendency, variance and probability distribution, in the backdrop of the operational problem at the Express Mall in Chennai. Kumaresan, the Managing Director of Express Mall, was deliberating on how to improve the customer experience at the parking lots as he had been receiving complaints of longer waiting times at the entry as well as the exit points. He had to determine the appropriate pricing and manpower requirement based on the mall’s parking lot’s demand.
Prerequisite Conceptual Reading(s)
The students/participants must be encouraged to read the following as it would provide appropriate perspectives on descriptive statistics and probability distribution:
• Richard I. Levin and David S. Rubin, “Chapter 2: Grouping and Displaying Data to Convey Meaning: Tables and Graphs”, Statistics for Management, 7th Edition, Pearson Education, 2008
• A Aczel and J Sounderpandian, Complete Business Statistics, McGraw Hill, 2008
Case Positioning and Setting
This caselet can be used in MBA or Executive Programs to teach courses such as Business Statistics and Marketing Analytics.
Assignment Questions
I. What do you infer from the descriptive statistics of the weekday and weekend data?
II. Examine whether the random variable, ‘duration of stay’, for weekdays and weekends follows normal distribution.
III. Which distribution should be used to represent the random variable, ‘duration of stay’, during weekends?
IV. It was noticed that during weekends, customers tend to stay for a longer duration, resulting in nonavailability of parking lots. Using the data, examine whether there is evidence to support that customers stay for a longer period during weekends than weekdays.
V.............
Preamble to this Case Study Analysis
This caselet was used to offer participants/students insights about measures of central tendency and probability distribution. These measures were discussed and analysed in the light of the Express Mall’s parking lot issues. Accordingly, this caselet was orchestrated as shown in [Exhibit (TN)-I]...........
Exhibits
Exhibit (TN)-I: Suggested Classroom Orchestration
Exhibit (TN)-II: Descriptive Statistics for Weekdays
Exhibit (TN)-III: Descriptive Statistics for Weekends
Exhibit (TN)-IV: Density Plot for Weekday Data
Exhibit (TN)-V: Plot of Probability Density of Duration of Stay for Weekend
Exhibit (TN)-VI: P-P Plot for Weibull Distribution
Exhibit (TN)-VII: t-test for Unequal Variance