Psycho-Analysis of Plaza Shoppers' Routing Behaviour

要旨

Fashion retailing is one type of businesses that relies heavily on the walking behavior of consumers. Retailers are often concerned with a truly profitable location with a high pedestrian flow. With the construction of many large shopping plazas worldwide in recent years, it is interesting and beneficial to know why some locations are frequently visited or passed by shoppers. This paper presents an investigation in modeling the routing pattern of fashion shoppers in two multi-storey shopping plazas in Hong Kong. The walking routes of shoppers within the plazas are recorded and stored in a GIS package. This walking pattern is then correlated first with a set of environmental or spatial variables within GIS; and second with non-spatial variables like degree of familiarity, demographic factors and shoppers' preferences obtained from direct interviews. The objective is to verify if shoppers' actual walking pattern really confirms with their psycho-behaviour. With these research findings, fashion retailers can be more assured in locating their stores and be able to weigh, more accurately, their investments in relation to expected benefits.