Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping by Paco Underhill
These days, I hardly do any of my shopping in real, brick and mortar shops. All of my books, music, films and software come from either Amazon or iTunes. Our groceries and household goods are ordered online from Sainsbury’s and I get Time magazine delivered. If there’s a choice between ordering online and buying from a physical shop, I’ll almost always opt for the former.
However, shops are still the preferred option for many people and for some goods like clothing and furniture, you can’t replace the ability to touch something before you buy it. Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping examines how people interact with these retail environments and why they make the decisions they do.
It’s easy to think of usability being entirely confined to the Web, but Paco Underhill’s book is a great example of the same core principles being applied in different contexts. It tells the story of how he set up his company, Envirosell, and developed the science of shopping. The premise of what they’ve been doing in shops over the last twenty years is remarkably similar to Web usability; observe what people do, infer meaning from it and offer recommendations based on what you conclude.
Why We Buy is neatly divided into five parts: an introduction, the mechanics of shopping, an analysis of different demographic groups, the dynamics of shopping and a final section on the Internet and global differences. Each uses short examples and stories to illustrate points rather than dry and lengthy theories. Underhill’s writing style is similar to Don Norman’s in The Design of Everyday Things in that it’s easy to digest and entertaining to boot. His reliance on witty anecdotes keeps you engaged and absorbing information without realising it.
One of my favourite examples in Why We Buy is of a newsstand in Grand Central Station. It was suffering from the fact that its long line was discouraging commuters, who were in a hurry to be somewhere, from stopping. Underhill observed the newsstand and noticed that almost all of the customers only had one hand free, since they were also carrying handbags, coats and so on. There was also nowhere to put their possessions down while they paid, so each transaction was delayed while commuters juggled their items between arms. If the newsstand designer had sacrificed some merchanise space for a small shelf near the counter, then this congestion would be greatly reduced.
While the main body of the book is entertaining and informative, I can’t help but feel a little disappointed with the chapter on the Internet. Although Underhill makes some valid points about its weaknesses, he doesn’t really present anything new or interesting. He comes across as a world-leading expert in the parts of the book which consider physical shops, but here he doesn’t have much to offer. One aspect of the Internet he laments is that there’s so much music available, but it’s difficult for people to find something they like without the equivalent of an in-store expert. Although this is true if you were using iTunes alone, Last.fm provides an excellent recommendation service which I’ve found to be extremely accurate and reliable.
That chapter aside, Why We Buy is a superb book which I’d highly recommend. It offers an insight into how usability works in physical environments and I’m sure that what I’ve learnt from it about human behaviour can also be applied to software. One thing’s for sure; I’ll never look at a shop in quite the same way again.
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