Stanford Online Course: Crash Course in Creativity

Lecturer: Tina Seelig Executive Director, Stanford Technology Ventures Program

Assignment #1: ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION?

Author: Christian Tom

Date: October 25, 2012, Germany

Observation Lab Shop: RoFu Kinderland RoFu Kinderland is a shop which sells a huge range of products for children. They have school items, clothing, toys, sweets and even bicycles. The prices are at a midrange level with discounts. While visiting this shop I made the following observations: 1. Entrance On the entrance you can see the logo of the store: to little foxes hand in hand, smiling and with a heart print on their t-shirts. The underlying suggestions: were made for your children, nice and we just want your best.

A thing which really got my attention is the the image of the shop at the entrance. You can find any very welcome or something like that. Just when you leave the shop it says thank you for your visit. So I thought ok your starting to be nice after Ive done something for you. Another thing which made me feeling uncomfortable with the presentation of the shop is that the first thing I really saw are sign which says we are videorecording or Caution: shoplifting. It seems that they had some problems with that but is that really the best way to welcome visitors? Additionally they made up glass walls and a screen which shows clearly the pictures of observation cameras. Am I in a children shop or prison?

2. Environment Music is playing in the background but is rock really the music for children stores?

3. Personnel I wasnt really noticed by the salesperson. They are over 20 years and all female.

4. Products A really plump strategy: the most expensive items are placed at eye level and there are no price stickers at the shelves. I guess because of the fast changing product range they stick the price directly at the products but so small that the first attention is put on the article. Parents have no chance against crying children. Well thought.

At the cashier register they placed all the sweets to attract the little children and the poor parents need to pay.

5. Customer The customers are children with parents at the age of 4 to 12 years. They tend to spend clearly more than 30 minutes in the store and are browsing through it which is encouraged buy the different sections full crowded of merchandise. 4

Shop: Shoe4You Shoe4You is a shoe shop which sells own brands as well as high quality brands like Adidas. While visiting the shop I made the following observations: 1. Entrance I could just make a picture of the entrance because after that they forbid me to go on with that and I had to explain clearly what Im doing. The entrance dont really draws a person it. The door is closed and its not colourful. The advertisement makes the philosophy of this store clear: brand products offered at favourable prices (Why pay more?)

2. Environment It smells after leather and the newest songs are playing in the radio to stimulate the customers. Special golden stones on the floor are leading the customer straight to a middle platform with the newest and most expansive shoes. The ceiling and the walls are more cheap than high quality.

3. Personnel The salesperson was really fast. It didnt take even two seconds until he initiated contact with me (maybe the photo I took?). They are really nice and happy to children and everyone is female because of the stereotype that women are more fashion-savvy than men.

4. Products One notable fact is that they place the cheapest and discounted products at the least accessible locations. This speaks for itself. The prize is easy to find but the focus lies on the size of the shoes.

5. Customer The customers are mostly alone and in the age of 20 40 years old. Every customer tends to walk straight through the shop to the special platform made even more visible through a red carpet. The strategy is really good in unconscious influencing.

6. Miscellaneous Miscellaneous products like chains or scarves are placed next to the cash register.

Shop: DM Drogerie-Markt The dm-drogerie markt GmbH & Co. KG is a German company, which operates drugstores in eleven European countries under the brand name dm. Most of the products are from their own brand. The strategy of dm is CRM oriented and the use the Efficient-Customer-Response model. These are the observations I made: 1. Entrance DM used to have products outside of the store but they removed them. The reason might be theft. The entrance from the outside is simple and not really attracted. But from the inside they placed a packing station with everything necessary to create a proper packaging for a gift. Additionally they encourage environmental correct waste separation.

2. Environment The environment is kept really colourful and attracting with a huge variety of products. Theres no music in the background and the store smells a little bit after perfume. New for me was that they have a very high technological photo development station and a computer which provides scientific health consulting. It can also scan the products and inform the customer more detailed about the characteristics.

The lighting of this shop confused me because in the beginning it was more expansive with beautiful bulbs but in the rear part of the shop it changed to cheap neon lighting. Did they run out of money or what?

The store is really crowded with merchandise which makes it difficult to shop really fast and get out there in less than 15 minutes. 3. Personnel It took a long time until a salesperson initiated contact. The shop is clearly understaffed for its size. The personnel were just female and the majority was under 20 years old.

4. Products The shop placed all cheap and small products at the entrance area which everybody needs to pass. They order their products after function and within a function after brands.

They dont have any strategy with the placing of their products. Thanks to the observation I realized the first time that DM dont really have any discounts on products. Another notable special feature is the price sign which indicates the last date of an increase in the price of the product. Thats indeed special and I can hardly imagine another store with that. Toilet paper is placed at the end.

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5. Customer The customers are normally over 20 years old and tend more to browse through the store encouraged by the variety of products and the warm colours. Thats a good strategy. Nearly 98 percent are buying something in this store.

6. Miscellaneous As additional service dm is providing free water for its visitors.

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Shop: OBI Founded in 1970, OBI GmbH & Co. Deutschland KG is the second largest DIY retailer in Europe, and the fourth largest in the world, behind The Home Depot, Lowe's and B&Q. They offer products for the construction and DIY equipment as well as housewares and garden tools. Obi is especially known by their brand symbol: a beaver. These are my observations: 1. Entrance The entrance of OBI with all its signal colours, all its big size and letters declares really dominantly: Im the giant here, you can find everything what you need. Its the biggest building and biggest sign lettering within the radius of the other shops.

In the entrance they placed cheap plants and tools for the garden. Additionally they rent a space to a bakery to attract more people and you can buy drinks directly at the entrance.

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2. Environment The environment and structure of the store attribute to a warehouse feeling (high ceilings, visible pipes and long neon lighting) where people can easily feel small and being lost. I would not stay longer than necessary here. But they placed many different lights and bulbs like on a funfair to encourage browsing for the customers. The environment seems to suggest that they saved expenses of marketing in order to provide lower priced products.

3. Personnel The store is really big so it takes longer until a salesperson starts to initiate contact. They all have more or less uniforms and where nice to me with providing information about OBI. All of them were older than 25 years and made a competent impression.

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4. Products The first product I noticed were of course the light bulbs with their different size and brightness. The for-sale and cheapest products were placed in lines before the cashier register where every customer hast to cross them. Practically they were pressed on the customers. The picture captures beautiful the fact how customers even think of buying more after they started to go to the cashier register.

Another notable specific is the colouring of the price signs. They are red, yellow and white. I couldnt make up the underlying goal of that but another interesting thing happened: There was a frame around the yellow price which stated Beaver fan price. So I thought maybe I will get a discount when Im becoming a Facebook Fan and I asked the service and immediately they gave me a leaflet of a special member program. A nice strategy to get customers familiar with it.

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The costumers fit more in the older field and are mostly husband and wife. They tend to be over 30 minutes in this store and are more on a mission than browsing around. Around 75 percent are buying something in the store.

6. Miscellaneous On the parking lot I saw a van which is used by OBI to deliver ordered or big products. It has the lettering Rent me for 19 Euro per hour and additionally they put even a lineal with the size of the van on it. So if you are in need of one you already know if it fits to your requirements. Well done!

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Shop: Staples Staples Inc. is a large office supply chain store, with over 2,000 stores worldwide in 26 countries. Their selling supplies, office machines, promotional products, furniture, technology and business services both in stores. They also are involved in ECommerce with their E-Shop. Here are my observations: 1. Entrance The circumstances of the entrance area are good for the store because outside its more dark and cold and you want to go just in the brighter and warm store. The sign lettering says Megamarkt which indicates that you can really find everything here.

Before the store they placed products too but all of them arent products for theft because they are big and heavy. Thats a good security aspect.

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2. Environment The environment made me feel like being in a logistics warehouse because there was long neon lightning, no warm colours, really high ceilings, one could see the pipes on the ceiling and it smelled after carton. Just the music in the background makes it more positive because its chillout music which invites to stay longer. I wouldnt stay there longer than necessary.

3. Products They placed the cheapest products directly at the entrance and cashier register where every customer is coming over. In the least accessible places they put items which arent bought so often (whiteboards, packaging etc.). In the store the products are grouped by function.

4. Customer The customers are mostly alone and over 25 years old. They dont walk the same direction and are stay around 20 minutes in the store. Nearly everyone is buying a product because they are more on a mission than browsing through the store.

5. Miscellaneous This store really need to get rid of its cold, big warehouse feeling!!

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Shop: EMPIRE Videothek EMPIRE is a German video library which offers movies and games both for rent or sale. They are also operating an adult video library next to their normal ones. I made the following observations: 1. Entrance The entrance is really appealing because there are interesting figures placed and the door is opened. It seems that the shop is calling come in, you will find really interesting stuff.

2. Environment The environment makes a person to have the feeling of being at home: the radio is playing with news, the floor is a carpet, they used more dark and calm colours. One negative aspect is the distinctive smell of plastic and the ceiling with shows pipes and cheap neon lighting. But the environment really invites someone to pass more time there and browse through the offered products.

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3. Personnel The store is quite understaffed because one person has to organize and manage two video libraries (the normal and adult one). So it can occur that a customer has to wait a couple of minutes before he get served at the cashier register.

4. Products The first products I noticed are the most expensive one to rent: new 3D BluRay movies. The store used bright signal colours to attract the attention immediately to that shelves after a person enters the store.

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The store also offers unconventional products for a video library: ice, drinks, food, ninja-swords, t-shirts and more, placed on the way to the cashier register.

5. Customer The average customers are mostly male and over 25 years old. Most of them fit to the Gamer-Stereotype and are browsing through the store which is engaged by the environment and the normal behaviour in video libraries. 20

Endnotes Sources of pictures: http://www.stanford.edu/~jacksonm/stanfordlogo.gif http://cacm.acm.org/system/assets/0000/7705/041712.Tina.Seelig.Color.Innovation.E ngine.jpg Own camera

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