Customer's satisfaction with retail chains

This paper aim was aimed at showing the consumers´ perceptions about retail chains in Croatia and their level of satisfaction with each aspect of related shopping experience as well as overall satisfaction with the retail chains. As it deals with satisfaction, great part of the paper is also dealing with the theory on and related to satisfaction while putting today´s consumers in perspective. Today's consumers are far more demanding than before, expect far more from companies and are stressed both in terms of time and money and know exactly what they want/need. Retail chains in regards to that but also to other factors (e.g. more urban, busy life) experienced some significant developments and are increasingly putting efforts into satisfying the consumers. Consumer satisfaction is influenced by perceptions, expectations and is basically how consumers react to consumer value received and level of satisfaction is determined by the extent of the gap between actual performance and perceived performance. There are many consumer satisfaction measurement tools and techniques that can help in understanding the consumers and serving them better. Concerning the research, the survey was conducted and sample collected amounted to 310 participants which, although being relatively small, is still due to its diversity considered as highly indicative. The participants were given seven set of questions in total and the basic conclusion is that consumers are in general, according to average grades, mostly to somewhat satisfied with retail chains in Croatia, but that there is still room for improving, especially related to some aspects