Reading Practice
The way the brain buys
Supermarkets take great care over the way the goods they
sell are arranged. This is because they know a lot about how
to persuade people to buy things.
When you enter a supermarket, it takes some time for the mind to
get into a shopping mode. This is why the area immediately inside
the entrance of a supermarket is known as the ‘decompression
zone’. People need to slow down and take stock of the
surroundings, even if they are regulars. Supermarkets do not
expect to sell much here, so it tends to be used more for
promotion. So the large items piled up here are designed to
suggest that there are bargains further inside the store, and
shoppers are not necessarily expected to buy them. Walmart, the
world’s biggest retailer, famously employs ‘greeters’ at the
entrance to its stores. A friendly welcome is said to cut
shoplifting. It is harder to steal from nice people.
Immediately to the left in many supermarkets is a ‘chill zone’,
where customers can enjoy browsing magazines, books and DVDs.
This is intended to tempt unplanned purchases and slow customers
down. But people who just want to do their shopping quickly will
keep walking ahead, and the first thing they come to is the fresh
fruit and vegetables section. However, for shoppers, this makes no
sense. Fruit and vegetables can be easily damaged, so they should
be bought at the end, not the beginning, of a shopping trip. But
psychology is at work here: selecting these items makes people
feel good, so they feel less guilty about reaching for less healthy
food later on.
Shoppers already know that everyday items, like milk, are
invariably placed towards the back of a store to provide more
opportunity to tempt customers to buy things which are not on
their shopping list. This is why pharmacies are also generally at
the back. But supermarkets know shoppers know this, so they use
other tricks, like placing popular items halfway along a section so
that people have to walk all along the aisle looking for them. The
idea is to boost ‘dwell time’: the length of time people spend in a
store.
Having walked to the end of the fruit-and-vegetable aisle,
shoppers arrive at counters of prepared food, the fishmonger, the
butcher and the deli. Then there is the in-store bakery, which can
be smelt before it is seen. Even small supermarkets now use in-
store bakeries. Mostly these bake pre-prepared items and frozen
ingredients which have been delivered to the supermarket
previously, and their numbers have increased, even though central
bakeries that deliver to a number of stores are much more
efficient. They do it for the smell of freshly baked bread, which
arouses people’s appetites and thus encourages them to purchase
not just bread but also other food, including ready meals.
Retailers and producers talk a lot about the ‘moment of truth’.
This is not a philosophical idea, but the point when people
standing in the aisle decide to buy something and reach to get it.
At the instant coffee section, for example, branded products from
the big producers are arranged at eye level while cheaper ones
are lower down, along with the supermarket’s own label products.
But shelf positioning is fiercely fought over, not just by those
trying to sell goods, but also by those arguing over how best to
manipulate shoppers. While many stores reckon eye level is the
top spot, some think a little higher is better. Others think goods
displayed at the end of aisles sell the most because they have the
greatest visibility. To be on the right-hand
side of an eye-level selection is often considered the very best
place, because most people are right-handed and most people’s
eyes drift rightwards. Some supermarkets reserve that for their
most expensive own-label goods.
Scott Bearse, a retail expert with Deloitte Consulting in Boston,
Massachusetts, has led projects observing and questioning tens of
thousands of customers about how they feel about shopping.
People say they leave shops empty- handed more often because
they are ‘unable to decide’ than because prices are too high, says
Mr Bearse. Getting customers to try something is one of the best
ways of getting them to buy, adds Mr Bearse. Deloitte found that
customers who use fitting rooms in order to try on clothes buy the
product they are considering at a rate of 85% compared with 58%
for those that do not do so.
Often a customer struggling to decide which of two items is best
ends up not buying either. In order to avoid a situation where a
customer decides not to buy either product, a third ‘decoy’ item,
which is not quite as good as the other two, is placed beside them
to make the choice easier and more pleasurable. Happier
customers are more likely to buy.
adapted from The Economist
Questions 1-4
Label the diagram below.
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for
each answer.
Layout of typical supermarket
1.....................
2.....................
3.....................
4.....................
Questions 5-10
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the
reading passage?
Write
TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
5..................... The ‘greeters’ at Walmart increase sales.
6..................... People feel better about their shopping if they buy
fruit and vegetables before they buy other food.
7..................... In-store bakeries produce a wider range of
products than central bakeries.
8..................... Supermarkets find right-handed people easier to
persuade than left-handed people.
9..................... The most frequent reason for leaving shops without
buying something is price.
10..................... ‘Decoy’ items are products which the store
expects customers to choose.
Questions 11-13
Complete the flowchart below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for
each answer.
In-store bread production process
The supermarket is sent 11..................... and other items which
have been prepared earlier.
Baking bread in-store produces an aroma.
Shoppers’ 12..................... are stimulated.
They are then keener to buy food, including bread and
13.....................
