ABSTRACT
A point-of-sale’s atmosphere influences the customer’s reaction and experience by exposing him to a variety of stimuli. In accordance to the model of emotional induction, a brand’s retail atmosphere is a holistic concept combining atmospheric dimensions (such as smell, temperature, colours, music and smell), design dimensions and social dimensions. It affects customers’ emotional and behavioural reactions.
Once at the point of sale (traditional store or online platform), the customer looks at the retail environment holistically. Even if the brand carefully designs all atmospheric dimensions, the customer’s evaluation looks at the totality of the environment; claims stating that customers have to be in an orchestrated environment to be immersed are overestimated. There are more criteria that are considered in the retail equation before making such claims.
Today’s retail atmospheres have grown and evolved to be elaborative, engaging and enchanting. Retail atmospheres can be physical and virtual and can be proposed in traditional stores, concessions or any other formats. Even if the following sections detail traditional retail store atmospheres, our aim is to present givens related to traditional physical stores (as academic content has been focused on traditional physical environments) and to relate them to the case of ephemeral stores, since the later are conceived with attention to their atmospheres or environments.
