ABSTRACT

Research into retail environments identifies the role of the threshold as being a transitional space in the built environment between store exterior and interior. The threshold as a point of entry has multiple perspectives that retailers consider in different ways in relation to their online virtual and offline physical space. This chapter explores how the retail approach to the customer's experience of the physical space can be applied to museum entrances. This can include how lighting, contrast and colour, browsing and scanning behaviour, navigational aids, flow and transitional mind/mood states, can all affect customer behaviour as customers enter stores, as well as how previously learned behaviour about the store can inform future visits. The chapter discusses how thresholds can be thought of in relation to a 'customer journey' or 'experience environment' and how this can be linked to the 'corporate' strategy and identity of a particular organization through a 'servicescape'.