Shopping is an activity that everyone has to do quite often. You usually go shopping for fresh food, snacks, and drinks, etc. You sometimes go shopping alone, with friends, or your family. Have you ever wandered into a shop with a list of few things, only come out with twice as much stuff? There is a reason for this, and they work.
Smell is a common trick used to get shoppers spending. Most supermarkets now welcome customers with the smell of fresh bread and roast chicken to make you hungry, in which case you are much like to buy food. Imagine if you are starving. Many restaurants and fast food outlets use the same trick and send kitchen smells onto the street to attract more customers.
More popular items are usually in the middle of aisles so that you have to walk further, past more products to reach them. Products that shops want to promote are placed at eye-level or at the end of aisles to get maximum attention. Many companies pay shops to place their products there. They do this to make you buy their products.
Have you ever noticed that certain shelves in shops look untidy, as if customers have been moving everything around? You may think that people would be put off by this. But retailers often make areas look untidy. So that customers believe they are looking at “reduced priced” products or a very popular promotion. Would wouldn’t like things that are on sales?
Even the way floors are designed can make you spend more. In many supermarket, the tiles in aisles with expensive items are smaller so that it sounds as if your trolley is moving faster, which makes you slow down and spend more in that area. Other shop remove windows, so that you have les connection with the outside world and are more likely to spend more time shopping. If you cannot see that it is getting dark outside, you are more likely to take your time inside the shop.
Retailers would quickly go out of business if we walked straight in, bought what we need, then walked straight out again. Similarly, in clothes shops, fitting rooms and cash desks are usually far from the entrance. Shopping malls usually have complicated floor plans so that it is easy to get in, but harder to find your way out. Also, separating escalators between floors means you have to walk around the mall to go up to another level. The more time you spend inside, the more money you are likely to spend.