Why We Buy By Paco Underhill

Understanding consumer behaviour is essential to succeed in business. As Solomon et al. (2013) stresses, businesses exist to satisfy consumer’s needs. By identifying and understanding the factors that influences their customers, firms have the opportunity to develop a more efficient strategy, marketing message and advertising campaigns that is more in line with the needs and ways of thinking of their target consumers (Perreau, 2015).

&nbsp;After working for approximately three years in a bicycle shop where this characteristic can be easily observed, I have found that customers will continue on their decided path of examining merchandise and comparing prices, without regard for any added stimuli. &nbsp;During the busier seasons, it seems especially true that one could, as stated by Sammy, "set off dynamite . . . and the people would by and large keep reaching and checking" (Updike 371). &nbsp;This characteristic alienates the employee from customers: in most cases, they are held to the belief that finding the lowest priced, lowest quality item is necessary; they expect the employee to understandingly ring up six pairs of checkered spandex cycling shorts that have been laying harmlessly dormant in the "bargain bin" since the 1980's. &nbsp;Sammy identifies this idea also by stating, "what do these bums do with all that pineapple juice?" (Updike 371).<p>

Modern retail stores have to use a variety of techniques in order to lure and keep customers inside their stores. Without paying customers there is no retail store. This shows the importance of the consumer and how much influence they have over modern retail companies. These Fortune 500 companies pay top dollar to know how they can maximize product sales in every way possible. In The Science of Shopping Malcolm Gladwell interviews Paco Underhill, a retail anthropologist who's sole purpose is to study consumers' shopping habits and to determine the best store design for maximum profit. Over the years Paco has noticed various human tendencies that, if used properly, will increase a retail stores sales. Tendencies like: the Invariant right, Petting, and the Decompression Zone. I visited a local Walmart looking for evidence of Pacos work and recorded my findings.

When entering a store, is there a feeling of being watched? There are stores that have surveillance solely for the reduction of stolen merchandise. Then there are stores that have more than the regular surveillance that tracks the customer throughout the store. The cameras watch what the consumers picks up, how much time spent in a specific area of the store or time not spent at the store. The checkout stand keeps a copy of the receipt of the items a person has bought every time. The copy of the receipt is sent to another computer for holding to see what has all been bought and by what customer. There are more reason to disagree with the claim that surveillance of consumers by retail anthropologist is manipulative and unethical, than there

Consumers greatly benefit from the studying of their shopping behaviors by retail anthropologists. Imagine a man named Dan, walks into a store with a few set items to buy in mind. Dan is determined to go in and buy those items. A few weeks prior the store had been examined to improve on providing what their customers want. Dan just so happens to be a frequent shopper at the store so his metadata influenced how store layout and placement of items. Normally, Dan would go to get what he wants and get distracted along the way but thanks to the improved layout and consideration for the shoppers needs in mind, Dan was finally able to quickly get what he wants and leave the store. Dan directly benefitted from having retail anthropologists use his data. Data taken from the YouTube video, “How stores track your shopping behavior” shows that with 2 shelf facing it takes 3.3 seconds to locate Post Bran Flakes, as opposed to 2.3 seconds with 4 shelf facing. Not only does Dan benefit from the consumer surveillance but so do all consumers. Now, let’s say another shopper named Lisa goes to the same store as Dan. Lisa hates the store because of their narrow walkways and being bombarded by things as she enter. Just as with Dan, she is subjected to surveillance to see how shoppers behave in that store. The

“What makes the supermarket congestion even worse is that shoppers are taking longer and longer to decide what they want to buy, because every product in America now comes in an insane number of styles and sizes.”

In Underhill’s book “Why we buy”, Underhill (2009) argued that in the US, customers walk towards the right after entering the store entrance, so the front right portion would be the most visited part of the store. Also, with a right-hand dominance, the most convenient place to place a product is on the right side when the customer is facing the shelf. With the same argument, Underhill infers that in the UK and Australia, with a left-hand dominance, the customer would walk to the left after entering the store, so the front left portion of the store is most-visited, and the best place to put a product is on the left when the customer is facing the shelf. Putting myself in the shoe of Gap about to open a store in London, I would test Underhill’s hypothesis to see if it is true. If Underhill is right, I would design the store to take advantage on the way people walk in the UK, that is, towrds the left of the store, so that I can influence the buying decision of the UK customers.

In today’s world of various products and services, businesses aim to excel and lead the competition by marketing the most number of consumers, which is a full time endeavor of business. To survive in the market, a firm or an organization has to be constantly innovating and understand the latest consumer trends and tastes. Marketers need to understand consumer behavior because the decision-making process for consumers is anything but straight forward. Consumers’ behaviors and their purchasing patterns is a huge advantage to understanding the way customers think and the reason for their purchases. Therefore, the study of consumer behavior is important because it allows the

Understanding consumer buying behavior entails marketing, relationships, and consumer behavior. Consumer behavior comprises all the consumer decisions and activities connected with the choosing, buying, using and disposing of goods and services. Marketers must pay very close attention to consumer behavior that occurs before the purchase and after the particular product has been used. Studying consumer habits is one of the steps in marketing search and analysis. In addition to other basic principles of consumer buying habits, marketers also need to study the decision and actions of real people. Until recent history the study of consumer behavior was focused on generalized consumer decisions. With

Shopper behavior is outlined as “behavior that shopper show in sorting out buying, victimization evaluating and doing away with product and services that they expect can satisfy their desires and wants”. The study of shopper behavior is that the however the people create call

These developments in marketing activities, for instance the rise of 24-hours retailing and online shopping, create new opportunities for retailers to influence the shopper’s buying behaviour. Therefore, retailers invest considerable resources in in-store shopper marketing in order to stimulate the shopper’s unplanned and/or impulsive buying behaviour (Bell, Corsten, and Knox, 2009). However, in order to understand the actual impact, it is necessary to clarify the concept of unplanned and impulsive buying first. Rook and Fisher, and Beatty and Ferrell (as cited in Bell, Corsten, and Knox, 2011) address impulsive buying behaviour and unplanned buying behaviour as two distinct terms. More specifically, impulsive buying behaviour is described as a spontaneous urge to purchase, while unplanned buying behaviour is described as an absence of a buying decision before the shopping trip actually starts (Beatty and Ferrell, as cited in Bell et al., 2011). Furthermore, Block and Morwitz (1999) claim that planned purchases are often at category level and unplanned purchases are rather at brand and stock keeping unit level. In other words, the shopper often already identified the product type he/she want to buy before the shopping trip starts. However, the shopper has not decided yet which brand or amount he/she is going to buy. To illustrate, only approximately ten percent of

A lot is on the line; its win or lose at the retail retire. Studies demonstrate that when purchasers shop, they settle on decisions in as meager as 20 seconds. They likewise disregard up to 2/3 of classification items in retail situations. These insights clarify why such a variety of items fall flat.

There is science behind everything, including shopping, there are reasons why stores are arranged a certain way it is not just because it looks “pretty”, but how do store managers know where to place certain items in certain places? And does it improve sales? Malcolm Gladwell wrote “The Science of Shopping” in which he reveals that the reason why stores are organized a specific way is because they hire people such as Paco Underhill. According to Gladwell he is a “retail anthropologist” and an “urban geographer” which means he studies the shopping behavior. When Underhill is hired he sets up cameras all around the store and after a few days of filming people as they shop and studying their every move. He then sells this information to the stores so they can use it to improve their business. Should it be allowed for people like Underhill to observe customers as they shop? People could debate on this topic saying that customers need privacy, but what Underhill does is ethical, clients should be watched in stores even if it is without their knowledge because it would help both consumers and businesses. Being able to observe people’s behavior in stores and seeing what they are attracted to would help the store increase sales by putting those items at a reachable place for them to grab. It would also benefit consumers because costumer service would improve. Lastly, being able to study shopping behavior would be easy for stores to see patterns and trends.

The purpose of this report is to explore the concept of impulse buying behaviour. By presenting different purchases scenarios, this document firstly attempts to define the concept of unplanned purchases in comparison with compulsive buying. The document analyses the different implications of impulsive purchases for marketers and attempts to suggest effective strategies in order to use impulsivity as leverage to increase sales. In addition it aims to underline the impact of different in store influences on impulsive behaviour and describe how these influences extremely encourage buying on impulse. Finally, this report tries to explain how in-store influences can be harmful on weak personality and discuss compulsive

Also according to Zaffar, Ghingold, and Zainurin (2006), two consumers may shop at the same stores for similar reasons, e.g. convenience, courteous help nice décor, etc., but one consumer my find shopping a burden, something to be done quickly within a minimum of effort while another may enjoy shopping, engaging in it as sport by achieving the satisfaction of buying a desired item at a bargain price. This latter consumer does not mind spending time searching for alternatives. Shopping involves much more than eye-sight and foot. That is what Paco Underhill (1999, p 161) said, "shopping is… the kind of activity I mean involves experiencing that portion of the world that has been deemed for sale, using our senses – sight, touch, smell, taste, hearing – as the basis for choosing this or rejecting that…virtually all unplanned purchases – and many planned ones, too – come as a result of the shopper seeing, touching, smelling or tasting something that promise pleasure, if not total fulfillment." It can seen that individual go shopping for some other reasons, beside to acquire a product, they also shop for non-purchase reasons such as looking for social interaction, sensory stimulation, learning for new rends and even exercise. That is, consumer can shop for utilitarian reasons related to achieving specific purchase goals. Alternatively, they can shop for hedonic reasons related to having fun.