Inside the Mind of the Shopper: The Science of Retailing [Hardcover]

What do you really do when you shop? The answers are fascinating and, for retailers, they're cash in the bank. In Inside the Mind of the Shopper, world-renowned retail consultant Dr. Herb Sorensen, Ph.D. uncovers the truth about the retail shopper and rips away the myths and mistakes that lead retailers to miss their greatest opportunities. Every year, says Sorensen, shoppers will spend a quadrillion seconds in supermarkets and they'll waste 80% of that time. Drawing on Sorensen's breakthrough second-by-second analysis of millions of shopping trips, this book reveals how consumers actually behave, move, and make buying decisions as they move through supermarkets and other retail stores. Sorensen presents powerful, tested strategies for designing more effective stores, improving merchandising, and driving double-digit sales increases. He identifies simple interventions that can have dramatic sales effects, and shows why many common strategies simply don't work. You'll learn how to appeal to the "quick trip" shopper; make the most of all three "moments of truth"; understand consumers' powerful in-store migration patterns; improve collaboration between manufacturers and retailers; learn the lessons of Stew Leonard's and other innovators; and much more. Then, in Part II, Sorensen presents revealing interviews with several leading in-store retail experts, including crucial insights on using technology and retailing to multicultural communities.

“Inside the Mind of the Shopper is the preeminent handbook for any marketer or retailer seeking to understand why people do what they do when they shop. Armed with the knowledge in this book, marketers and retailers can work together to predict how shoppers will respond (or not!) to package and label design, selling messages, shelf plans, and the entire retail space.”

—Matt Ohligschlager, Senior Manager, Consumer and Market Knowledge, Procter & Gamble

“From his 40 years of observing shoppers, Herb Sorensen has given us the gift of understanding shoppers. Now, we clearly see that the store layouts merchants want are not what shoppers want. On the ground, managers THINK they know their shoppers, but anyone who follows Herb’s handbook on shopper insights will know them a lot better.”

—Joel Rubinson, Chief Research Officer, The Advertising Research Foundation

Today, improving the effectiveness of the retail experience is no longer an option: It’s a matter of survival—and nobody knows more about doing that than Herb Sorensen. That’s because Sorensen understands your customer’s in-store behavior better than anyone else on earth.

Now, drawing on microscopic analysis of millions of shopping trips, Sorensen reveals exactly what your customers are thinking, why they behave as they do, and how to reshape stores to deliver truly remarkable results.

You’ll discover how to drive more profit from the “quick trip”...the three “moments of truth” in every shopping event...customer “migration patterns” within the store...and how to use “active retailing” to place products precisely where they’ll do best.

Author's Notes and Acknowledgments     xv

About the Author     xxi

Preface: Rethinking Retail     1

Introduction: Twenty Million Opportunities to Buy     5

Part I: Active Retailing     23

Chapter 1: The Quick Trip: Eighty Percent of Shopper Time Is Wasted     25

Chapter 2: Three Moments of Truth and Three Currencies     47

Chapter 3: In-Store Migration Patterns: Where Shoppers Go and What They Do     69

Chapter 4: Active Retailing: Putting Products into the Path of Shoppers     97

Chapter 5: Brands, Retailers, and Shoppers: Why the Long Tail Is Wagging the Dog     113

Part II: Going Deeper into the Shopper's Mind     131

Chapter 6: The Quick-Trip Paradox: An Interview with Unilever’s Mike Twitty     133

Chapter 7: Integrating Online and Offline Retailing: An Interview with Professors Peter Fader (The Wharton School) and Wendy Moe (University of Maryland)     147

Chapter 8: Multicultural Retailing: An Interview with Emil Morales, Executive Vice President of TNS Multicultural     161

Chapter 9: Insights into Action: A Retailer Responds: An Interview with Mark Heckman of Marsh Supermarkets     179

Part III: Conclusions     189

Chapter 10: The Internet Goes Shopping     191

Chapter 11: Game-Changing Retail: A Manifesto     199

Part IV: Appendix     205

Appendix: Views on the World of Shoppers, Retailers, and Brands     207

Index     213