Case study 1 (for the discussion of chapters 3 and 4)
Case study: Pelican Stores
Pelican Stores, a division of National Clothing, is a chain of women’s apparel stores operating through
out the country. The chain recently ran a promotion in which discount coupons were sent to customers
of other National Clothing stores. Data collected for a sample of 100 in-store credit card transactions at
Pelican Stores during one day while the promotion was running are contained in the file named
“PelicanStores”. The proprietary Card method of payment refers to charges made using a National
Clothing charge card. Customers who made a purchase using a discount coupon are referred to as
promotional customers and customers who made a purchase but did not use a discount coupon are
referred to as regular customers. Because the promotional coupons were not sent to regular Pelican
Stores customers, management considers the sales made to people presenting the promotional coupons
as sales it would not otherwise make. Of course, Pelican also hopes that the promotional customers
will continue to shop at its stores. In the data set, Items refers to the total number of items purchased
and Net Sales refers to the total amount ($) charged to the credit card.
Pelican’s management would like to use this sample data to learn about its customer base and to
evaluate the promotion involving discount coupons.
Managerial Report:
Use the tabular and graphical methods of descriptive statistics to help management develop a customer
profile and to evaluate the promotional campaign. At the minimum, your report should include the
following:
1. Percent frequency distribution for key variables.
2. A bar or pie chart showing the number of customer purchases attributable to the method of
payment.
3. A cross tabulation of type of customer versus Gender. Make comments.
4. A scatter diagram to explore the relationship between net sales and customer age. Produce
covariance and correlation matrix to support the scatter diagram
Customer
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Type of
Customer
Regular
Promotional
Regular
Promotional
Regular
Regular
Promotional
Regular
Promotional
Regular
Items
1
1
1
5
2
1
2
1
2
1
Net Sales
39.50
102.40
22.50
100.40
54.00
44.50
78.00
22.50
56.52
44.50
Method of
Payment
Discover
Proprietary Card
Proprietary Card
Proprietary Card
MasterCard
MasterCard
Proprietary Card
Visa
Proprietary Card
Proprietary Card
Gender
Male
Female
Female
Female
Female
Female
Female
Female
Female
Female
Marital
Status
Married
Married
Married
Married
Married
Married
Married
Married
Married
Married
Ag
e
32
36
32
28
34
44
30
40
46
36
Case Study: National Health Care Association
The National Health Care Association is concerned about the shortage of nurses the health care
profession si projecting for the future. To learn the current degree of job satisfaction among nurses, the
association sponsored a study of hospital nurses throughout the country. As part of this study, 50
nurses in the sample indicated their degree of satisfaction with their work, their pay and their
opportunities for promotion. Each of the three aspects of satisfaction was measured on a scale from 0
to 100, with larger values indicating higher degrees of satisfaction. The data collected also showed the
type of hospital employing the nurses. Data file named “Health”.
Managerial Report:
Use methods of descriptive statistics to summarize the data. Present the summaries that will be
beneficial in communicating the results to others. Discuss your finding. Specifically, comment on the
following questions:
1. On the basic of entire data set and three job satisfaction variables, what aspect of the job is
most satisfying for the nurses? What appears to be the least satisfying? In what area(s), if any,
do you feel improvements should be made? Discuss.
2. On the basic of descriptive measures of variability, what measure of fob satisfaction appears to
generate the greatest difference opinion among the nurses? Explain.
3. What can be learned about the types of hospitals? Does any particular type of hospital seem to
have better level of job satisfaction than the other types? Do your results suggest any
recommendations for learning about and improving job satisfaction? Discuss.
4. What additional descriptive statistics and insights can you use to learn about and possibly
improve job satisfaction?