Retail tricks on the nose
Smart retailers aren't just relying on a shop window to lure shoppers inside their doors these days. Specially created mood music, strategically placed racks of clothing, dim lighting and even special aromas are being used to entice shoppers inside the front door. Retailers hope these techniques will encourage shoppers to stay a little longer than they might have intended and spend a little more than they might be able to afford. Nina Lees reports.
Is that the smell of a fresh orange you detect in your favourite store? Or maybe the soft smell of geranium flowers? No, you're not mistaken. Increasingly more and more fashion retailers are pumping these aromas into their store in an attempt to lure passers-by into their store.
And we've all been into a store that has music blaring so loudly that you can't even hear yourself think. The chances are that the thumping beat that gives the feel of a nightclub is no accident. Far more likely is that if the music is giving you a headache instead of encouraging you to spend, then you aren't the target demographic. But the teeny boppers that frequent the store love it, and often find themselves splashing extra cash in these environments.
Welcome to the next generation of retail enticements that could just alter your entire mood and approach to shopping. And while there aren't many retailers on top of these clever marketing gimmicks just yet, they will be soon enough. The bottom line is that retailers need to be enticed back into the store given they could choose to instead shop online, by phone or mail order rather than venturing to the nearest shopping mall.
Michael Morrison, retail marketing expert and retail consultant at Melbourne's Monash University, says retailers need to wise up to the new tools at their disposal that could enable them to increase their sales significantly with very little outlay.
"If a retailer has the right music playing at the right volume, and also has the right aromas in the store, great colour-scheme and the right lighting, it can be a very powerful mix. In fact, it can actually change the perception of time for a consumer and make them stay in your store far longer than they intended," Morrison explains.
So how does a retailer achieve the equivalent of shopping nirvana?
Some pretty big names in the retailing game have been employing people to help them create the perfect play list that can actually encourage consumer spending.
It is a tactic deployed by the likes of Target, Myer Miss Shop and kids' retailer Pumpkin Patch.
Sydney's SBA Music creates play lists and supplies the hardware used in Myer's Miss Shop. It was asked to source music that reinforced the company brand and entertained shoppers nearly 10 years ago.
SBA asks retailers a series of questions that cover key marketing, financial and operational considerations and from there can recommend the best play list.
And the right lighting can also play its part at sweetening the deal for shoppers - as anyone who has been trying to try on a pair of bathers in a tiny change room with fluorescent lighting over head knows only too well. And Morrison agrees that making the investment in appropriate lighting can make or break the balance sheet.
Then there is the relatively new tactic that some say will take retailers by storm in the next year: scent marketing, which literally encourages shoppers to follow their nose right into your store. Research suggests shoppers will stay 30% longer in a sweet-smelling store, and it can cost as little as $30 a month.
And there's proof. A study conducted by Dr Val Clulow, (OK) at Melbourne's Swinburne University of Technology, found that fragrance facilitates stronger positive perceptions. Specifically, it found that customers' perceived the quality of the merchandise to be higher, that in-store service to be better and the intention to purchase was greater in stores that used aromas than those that didn't.
Dr Clulow, who has since moved onto Melbourne's Monash University, says the power of fragrance resonates with consumers and should not be underestimated.
"When people feel comfortable in their environment they are going to stay there longer. And fragrance helps people to feel comfortable.
"There is a good argument for retailers to develop a signature fragrance for their store, so that when shoppers go into a store like Just Jeans they recognise that fragrance straight away," Dr Clulow says.
Terry Jacobson, who runs the Australian arm of US-based aroma marketing company ScentAir, says 83 percent of all information people receive is visual.
Jacobson says the sense of smell is "emotionally affects" humans up to 75 percent than any other sense.
Counting several big name stores among the firm's client base, he says US department store Bloomingdales have employed a number of different "memory" evoking scents for different areas of the store. These include using the smell of baby powder in the childrenswear area, lilac in women's lingerie and the smell of coconut among the swimwear section.
Likewise a second customer, Lucky Jeans, uses the smell of cedarwood to communicate a sense of "age and classicness without mustiness".
But while some of the biggest names in Australian retailing have overlooked the power of aroma, youth retailer Supre has been leading the way for a whole decade. Supre rotates between a wide range of fragrances including vanilla, citris and a specially blended fragrance called GingerLily to titillate its young shoppers.
Scent marketing firm Ecomist, which is one of four scent marketing companies operating in Australia, works with Supre to create the right fragrance for its 150 stores across the country.
Ecomist national marketing manager Mark Gordon said Supre is a leader in the field of scent marketing but that he believes many more retailers would follow in the coming couple of years.
Gordon says a discreet dispenser can be installed in the retail environment to distribute subtle scents into the store.
"This is the next frontier in marketing, and a great way to appeal to the senses. The key is to make sure the scent isn't too overpowering, and that the scent is the right one for the retail environment," Gordon says.
Ecomist also works with surf retailer City Beach Surf, which has stores in Queensland, Sydney and Perth.
"We created a scent that we've called CocoWax for them, which has a Tropicana smell, with strawberry, coconut and mango smells included," Gordon says.
And rival scent marketing company Air Aroma has revealed that has been in discussions with retail heavyweight Myer about scenting in its stores.
"It is still very new to Myer, but they are looking into it," Air Aroma CEO John van Roemburg says.
He also works with women's fashion retailer Pilgrim, which uses the feminine fragrance of geranium oil to scent its stores.
"Pilgrim has the dark walls inside the store and great lighting and music playing, so the retail experience is a real winner."
And Roemburg has just landed a contact with upmarket retailer Cartier to scent its 250 boutiques across the globe with a signature scent he has developed especially.
"They have chosen a scent that we have created for them that has all the ingredients that make you think of top quality. It's a really complex scent that has hues of finished wood, beeswax and leather."
Roemburg warns that there is a science to finding the right scent.
"We need to understand the market before we create a scent, looking at the breakdown of shoppers, the age group, the colour scheme, the temperate of the store and whether or not food will be served in the store, which can all help us determine the right aroma for each environment," he says.
"No scent at all can be bad, with the smell of customers and body odour overpowering a shop pretty quickly."
And the wrong scent can do some real damage, while an aroma liked by the store owner isn't necessarily the best to attract shoppers, he says.
"I once walked into a store and smelt a coconut smell at Christmas time, which has the totally wrong affect on a consumer.
"Whereas geranium has a classy feel, but it is for the slightly older shopper. And you have to be careful with lavender and rose. They were popular for a while, but they are a bit outdated now."
Morrison says there are some retailers getting the mix just right, but many more have a lot more work yet to do. He named Alanna Hill as one of the best examples of using lighting, Sportsgirl for its music and store design, Peter Alexander for tempting the senses and Supre for its leadership in the area of scent marketing.
"Even if a retailer has a fantastic product, the retail experience has to be something very special these days given people are spending so much of their time online. Consumers want a different energy from their retail experience. They want to be able to be meet friends at a shop and socialise there, and they don't want to go into a change room and be greeted by bright lights, which can completely ruin the retail experience," Morrison says.
RETAIL TRICKS FROM AROUND THE WORLD:
* Some UK baby shops add baby powder to the air conditioning to remind people of a new born and to relax shoppers
* Multi level department stores encourage shoppers to see more of their store by making people walk half way around each level in order to find the next connecting escalator, as opposed to it being the one next to you. This has not happened by accident
* Some retailers are very clever with the types of flooring they use. Department stores make great use of carpet and linoleum to subtly steer customers around and hold them in certain places. The occasional rug and mats laid out in aisles has also shown to slow foot traffic
* Messing up displays on a sale rack, to make it appear as though customers have been sifting through items on sale, is a popular trick with shoppers are often hesitant to mess up pristine displays
* Most people can't help but check themselves out in the mirror, which are regularly placed in shopping areas to try and slow people down.
* Tests have shown that the colour purple is most likely to make customers feel like spending money
Source: Text: A-Z Retail Tricks To Make You Shop
By Nina Lees