How people really shop, measured on video: where they turn, what they touch, and why they walk away.
Underhill's Envirosell 'trackers' follow shoppers and film them in the act. What people report about their shopping and what the tape shows are often two different things.
The 'decompression zone': in the first steps inside, shoppers are slowing down and adjusting, and they notice almost nothing. Displays, signs, and greeters placed there are wasted.
Video after video shows people veering right as they settle in - the 'invariant right.' The front-right of the store is prime ground; fight the pattern or use it, but never ignore it.
The famous 'butt-brush effect,' discovered at a tie rack shoppers kept abandoning: customers, especially women, stop browsing a display when strangers bump them from behind. Wide aisles and breathing room protect sales.
Buying is hands-on and shopping is a sensory act. Glass, sealed packaging, and museum-like displays that block touch quietly cut sales; shoppers who take clothes into a fitting room buy at far higher rates.
People have two hands, and one is usually already holding a bag or coat. Once both are full, they stop picking things up - so put baskets where shoppers' hands fill up, not only at the door.
The rest of this summary — and the one thing to do this week — is in the PDF.
Download the free PDFThe big idea: shopping can be studied like a science. Paco Underhill, an environmental psychologist, founded Envirosell, a research firm whose 'trackers' follow and film real shoppers for hours, then tell retailers what actually happens in their aisles - which is often the opposite of what managers assume. What shoppers say they do and what the tape shows are frequently two different things.
Entering a store has rules. Shoppers speed through the 'decompression zone' at the front and notice almost nothing there, so key displays and signs placed there are wasted. Once settled, most people drift right - Underhill's 'invariant right' - so the right side is prime ground. Inside, touch is king: shoppers who cannot pick a product up rarely buy it, and having only two hands caps what they can carry. Crowding has a cost - the famous 'butt-brush effect,' where customers (especially women) abandon a display after being bumped from behind. Signs fail when they are long, small, or placed where nobody's eyes are.
