magdalenaffdc1

Paco Underhill is a consultant to a large number of retailers, studying how they work and advising them on ways to increase sales. He begins by describing how his team goes to retail outlets and inconspicuously (urban camouflage of khaki trousers, brown shoes, etc...) watches customers to see how they shop, or how they don't. By retail he includes just about any sort of business where the customers go in to purchase things, supermarkets, toy stores, clothing stores, department stores, fast food restaurants, family restaurants, banks and more. Chapters describe how shoppers move around in space, from the parking lot into the store, how stores should ideally be laid out to maximize shopping. For instance, he describes the entrance from a parking lot is a "dead zone" where shoppers are hurrying from outside, adjusting to the change in lighting, still getting their bearings but many retailers put the prime merchandise in the honored spot, and it's wasted because shoppers have not yet begun to shop! He gives recommendations on how to accommodate men, women, the elderly and small children (who he describes as a big force in shopping, through their influence on their adults with the money). All of those people shop in different ways and have different needs. And stores need to accommodate all of them at once, too. Throughout he tells lots of little stories from his own experience, either shopping at stores near his office, or as a consultant, occasionally naming his clients, business with big, household names, like Blockbuster Video, Macy's, Victoria's Secret, Radio Shack or Pathmark. "We are now dangerously overretailed -- too much is for sale, through too many outlets... Judging from birthrates, we are generating stores considerably faster tahn we are producing new baby shoppers." At times his writing is dry, technical, and at times he's over-the-top excited about shopping. It's in those latter that he gets pretty funny, really, and occasionally a little risque with double entendres. It's at those times, too, that dammit, I wanna go shopping!

2023-07-28 07:17