Negative impact on shoppers’ behavior

A lot of consumers’ studies about stores' environment do focus today mainly on positive impacts on shoppers' behavior; it might be worthwhile to spend some time on negative ones as well. Unpleasant feeling, discomfort during shopping time, might result from several direct causes like crowd, dirtiness... and those will immediately affect sales. I would like to focus on those hidden messages received or felt by customers in stores, which turn their shopping time into real stress.
While retail shops are working hard and with no restriction to please their clients and turn them into “delighted” ones (not only satisfied), while merchandisers are trying to develop and implement innovative concepts that stimulate purchases (“stores-within a store” concept, visual merchandising, flagship stores, …), customers are facing everywhere small negative messages, neutralizing all these efforts.


What are we talking about?


Take for example IKEA, now well known for its concept built around an imposed circulation (marks on the floor, store layout). Yes, this concept requires the clients to pass along all departments; but do they really like it? Although they are ready to play the game, most of them are likely to answer “no” simply because pleasure in purchasing goes with freedom: freedom to touch, freedom to circulate in the store... It appears that under the pretext of "organization", IKEA stores go against this basic principle.
In addition, the «imposed» exit often located far from the parking spot you parked your car in, makes it impossible to go back to your car with your trolley full of IKEA products; you have to leave it and walk back to your car with all your packs in the arms!! At that very time you for sure swear to do differently next time. Here are already good reasons not to be “delighted” and even worse not to be satisfied when leaving IKEA.


Achan in Russia developed the concept of dedicated check-out lines. Therefore, if you are not invalid or pregnant, if you have more than 10 products, if those products are not heavy, if you are not an Achan card holder or do not want to self pack your products, so if you are just a simple “standard” client, you will have to pay a lot of attention to pick the right line to queue.. (Around 30 % of checks out counters are dedicated). Again, negative impacts will be induced every time stores will be asking customers to do some efforts.


I do not even talk about signs carrying messages like “do not touch”, “we don’t take credit cards”…that reduce freedom space and put hurdles in the shopping process; or those ones who frighten customers instead of catching their attention: I remember the story during sales time in Moscow when this well known clothes store put in front of each good deal a big red “STOP” sign reminding more of ban road signs and of what should not be done than pushing people to buy.

 And what about this one, dispatched by Mosmart in Moscow to promote its stores: “удобне, без очередей” that means “more comfortable, without any queue”? Shall we really take that for a positive message or shall we think that if we will not queue there, that means there is no client in Mosmart and if there is no client, what does that mean?


All stimuli have impacts on customers ‘behavior. Unfortunately customers remember more often negative experience than positive ones, with the last feeling superseding all the previous ones. On top, unsatisfied customers are doing much more “advertising” than delighted ones…


For sure it is difficult to manage such a process as it refers to the psychological sphere and this sphere has different faces in different countries; but one thing is valid all over the world :discomfort during shopping time has an impact on sales.