International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management

Atmospheric cues and their effect on the hedonic retail experience

Paul W. Ballantine Richard Jack Andrew G. Parsons
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Paul W. Ballantine Richard Jack Andrew G. Parsons, (2010),"Atmospheric cues and their effect on the
hedonic retail experience", International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, Vol. 38 Iss 8 pp. 641
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Atmospheric
Atmospheric cues and their effect cues and their
on the hedonic retail experience effect
Paul W. Ballantine and Richard Jack
Department of Management, University of Canterbury, 641
Christchurch, New Zealand, and
Andrew G. Parsons
AUT Business School, Auckland University of Technology,
Auckland, New Zealand

Abstract
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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of atmospherics in the creation of an
hedonic retail experience by comparing the perceived differences between a retail environment
attempting to provide an hedonic experience and one with a more utilitarian focus.
Design/methodology/approach A qualitative methodology was employed, using protocol
analysis and in-depth semi-structured interviews that were conducted with ten participants.
Findings The paper highlights several atmospheric cues and their influence on the hedonic retail
experience. The first category of cues attractive stimuli were those cues that attracted attention,
exciting the participant and eliciting approach behaviours. The second category facilitating stimuli
included those cues that were necessary in order to facilitate product engagement.
Originality/value The paper provides a broad categorisation of atmospheric cues, providing
factors that shop designers can be aware of when creating a store with the hedonic experience in mind.
Keywords Retailing, Shop design, Consumer behaviour, Perception, Store ambience
Paper type Research paper

Introduction
Research concerning the effects of retail environments on consumer behaviour owes
much to the work of Kotler (1974). Coining the term atmospherics, Kotler (1974) argued
that buying environments can be purposefully designed to produce specific emotional
effects in shoppers, thereby enhancing their purchase probability. Although research
about the effects of emotion in retail environments is indebted to the work of Kotler, it
was not until Donovan and Rossiter (1982) that research in this area was popularised.
In their paper, the authors introduced the Mehrabian and Russell (1974) framework,
suggesting that it provides a parsimonious description of environments, intervening
variables and behaviours that are relevant to retail settings. Using this framework,
several authors (Baker et al., 1992; Donovan et al., 1994; Kaltcheva and Weitz, 2006;
Sherman et al., 1997) have explored how retail stores can affect the emotional states and
subsequent purchasing behaviour of consumers.
While the Mehrabian-Russell framework specifies the relationships between
intervening variables and response outcomes, it leaves the issue of an appropriate
stimulus taxonomy largely untouched. Drawing guidance from information theory, International Journal of Retail &
Mehrabian and Russell (1974) proposed a general measure of environmental stimulation Distribution Management
Vol. 38 No. 8, 2010
that would be applicable across many physical and social settings, that was termed pp. 641-653
the information rate, or load of an environment. However, since the work of Donovan q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0959-0552
and Rossiter (1982), researchers have largely explored how separate and distinct DOI 10.1108/09590551011057453
 IJRDM atmospheric variables such as music (Milliman, 1982; Morin et al., 2007; Yalch and
38,8 Spangenberg, 2000), colour (Bellizzi and Hite, 1992), odour/scent (Hirsch, 1995; Michon
et al., 2005; Spangenberg et al., 1996), lighting (Areni and Kim, 1994) and crowding
(Machleit et al., 2000) can affect consumer behaviour in retail store environments.
A small number of studies have also started to examine the interaction between these
variables, such as Baker et al. (2002) who explored the interaction between store design,
642 employees and music on perceptions of a retail store.
In an extensive review of the atmospherics literature, Turley and Milliman (2000)
established five broad categories of atmospheric cues, including: external cues (e.g.
architectural style and surrounding stores); general interior cues (e.g. flooring, lighting,
colour schemes, music, aisle width and ceiling composition); layout and design cues
(e.g. space design and allocation, grouping, traffic flow, racks and cases); point of
purchase and decoration displays (e.g. signs, cards, wall decorations, price displays);
and human variables (e.g. employee characteristics, uniforms, crowding and privacy).
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Within these broad categories, 57 specific cues were identified. There has also been a
trend in the literature to attempt to precisely categorise individual cues in order to
manipulate them and understand their effects (Chebat and Dube, 2000), and to this end,
much of the extant research literature has been conducted using experimental designs.
We suggest that there is a need to examine atmospherics and their effects from a
more holistic perspective. When a customer enters a store they do not experience the
music in isolation; they do not smell the scent without seeing the colours as well; they do
not walk on the floor-covering without feeling the ambient temperature. The typical
customer experiences degrees of all these and other stimuli as an ongoing, collective
experience. Certainly, parts of the store may smell different or not smell at all (Parsons,
2009), but the sense of olfaction is present throughout the store visit, whilst
experiencing the sounds, the sights, and the feel of the store, as they change, become
more dominant, or fade to the background. It is difficult, however, to measure a
multisensory experience using the traditional stimulus-organism-response of Donovan
and Rossiter (1982) largely because of the extensive set of interactions which need to be
examined. For example, thinking of the interactions of Turley and Millimans (2000) 57
specific cues we would have a combinatorial value of 57C2. . .56, resulting in over 29,000
three-way interactions alone (see Hyde, 2006 for an example of this in practice).
A possible reason for the paucity of literature utilising an holistic approach may be the
parsimonious linking of a utilitarian task orientation to the stimuli. Attempting to
ascertain clear causal links between controllable stimuli (e.g. music played in a store)
and desired behavioural or affective outcomes has driven researchers to address
manageable chunks of stimuli a few together at the most (Baker et al., 2002).
We suggest that the experiential retail concept has evolved into a fuller hedonic
experience desire for customers, and in this respect an holistic approach which looks to
understand the hedonic immersion a customer seeks and experiences because of the
atmospherics present is more relevant for todays shopper environment.

Retail atmospherics and hedonic consumption

Hedonic consumption is defined by Hirschman and Holbrook (1982, p. 92) as those
facets of consumer behaviour that relate to the multisensory, fantasy and emotive
aspects of ones experience with products. Hedonic consumption is differentiated from
utilitarian consumption as a reflection of shoppings entertainment and emotional
 worth (Babin et al., 1994). Moreover, utilitarian consumption is usually defined as a Atmospheric
task-related rational activity, with satisfaction being dependent on a product
acquisition mission being accomplished (Arnold and Reynolds, 2003).
cues and their
While an individual with an information processing task might seek function, results effect
and purpose, an experiential consumer seeks fun, enjoyment and pleasure. The
experience economy is perhaps the ultimate extension of this line of thought. Touted as
the logical progression from a service economy, experiences are posited to hold a greater 643
economic value than what goods or services can provide (Pine and Gilmore, 1998). In the
case of a retail environment, the experience relates to the service environment (including
atmospheric cues) transforming normal retailing into entertailing (Kim, 2001), where
retailers attempt to provide an experience and increase the length of stay in a store by
appealing to the multiple senses of sight, sound, smell and touch. The ideas outlined by
Kim (2001) are similar to the multisensory images discussed by Hirschman and
Holbrook (1982) and the list of atmospheric variables produced by Kotler (1974),
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suggesting a conceptual progression between atmospheric cues and the provision of

an hedonic experience.
Despite the emergence of a conceptual link between atmospheric cues and the
experience economy, research integrating these topics is sparse. The literature has been
almost entirely quantitative, with most papers focusing on either a single or few specific
cues. In contrast, this study aims to holistically examine how the atmospheric cues
encountered in a retail environment contribute to the creation of a hedonic retail
experience. Moreover, the interaction between these cues, and how perceptions of
atmospheric cues differ between a retail store focused on providing an hedonic
experience and one that does not will also be explored.

Methodology
Research was conducted using a within-subjects comparative case study design, with
the data being qualitative in nature (Miles and Huberman, 1994). This allowed for the
examination of a large range of cues and interactions that would not be possible in an
experimental design due to complexity issues. The case stores were selected on a
number of factors:
.
they needed to be selling similar products so that a realistic comparison of an
hedonic store with a non-hedonic store could be made;
.
these products needed to be as universally relevant as possible so that the
individual experience was not confounded by individual predilections; and
.
one of the stores needed to be providing an effective hedonic experience, and the
other needed to be identifiably utilitarian in nature (for adequate comparison);
this was established using a quantitative pre-test.

To satisfy these conditions, two consumer electronics stores in Christchurch,

New Zealand, were selected for this study. This store type was chosen due to the
availability of experiential retailers in this industry, and the precedent of using such
high involvement goods to ensure that both central and peripheral cues were noted by
participants (Zhang, 1996). Owing to confidentiality agreements with the two stores,
they will hereafter be referred to as Store A (hedonic) and Store B (utilitarian).
Data were obtained by two protocol interviews (one in each store). Protocol analysis
involves placing a person in a specified situation, and asking them to verbally express
 IJRDM their thoughts as they proceed through the situation (Ericsson and Simon, 1993).
38,8 Participants were fully briefed as to the nature of the study, and then tasked with
exploring each store, verbalising any atmospheric cues that they noticed, describing
what effect (if any) it had on them, and any behavioural outcomes arising from these
effects. The order of the stores was reversed for half of the participants. The protocol
interviews were followed by in-depth semi-structured interviews, allowing for deeper
644 discussion of the comments made during the protocol analysis.
Purposive sampling was used to recruit participants for this study, and was
considered appropriate given the aims of this research (Churchill and Iacobucci, 2005,
p. 327). Although an intercept approach was considered, it could potentially have led to
only one type of consumer being recruited the type normally found in the particular
electronics stores, and a purposive sampling approach mitigated this problem. Ten
participants were recruited to take part in this study. An equal number of males and
females took part, with a range of age groups represented. Based upon additional
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questions asked during the interviews, participants were varied in terms of both their
involvement with the retailer type and the products they sold, and their dominant
shopping motivation (i.e. utilitarian or hedonic). A profile of the participants included in
this study is provided in Table I.

Analysis and results

The data analysis followed five distinct stages. In the first stage, the voice recordings were
transcribed, resulting in approximately 160 pages of text. In the second stage,
following Carson et al. (2001), open coding was used to identify the atmospheric cues and
categories identified by participants. Next, using the NVivo software package, axial
coding was used to assign these codes to sections of text within the transcripts, and a
count was used as an approximate metric of cue importance. In the fourth stage, a second
level of coding was used to identify overall themes and interactions between cues.
Finally, the meanings and underlying causes of these themes as they relate to the hedonic
experience were identified. Given the potential for multiple interpretations during the
coding process, two independent judges were used to authenticate the findings.
The open coding process identified ten categories of atmospheric cues that impacted
either positively or negatively on the hedonic retail experience. The ten categories
(with the NVivo coverage statistic given in parentheses) were product display

Previous store Involvement with Shopping

Pseudonym Age group experience retailer type motivation

Amy Older None Low Utilitarian

Bevin Younger A and B High Utilitarian
Chris Middle aged A and B High Hedonic
Dee Younger A and B High Hedonic
Eddy Middle aged B only High Utilitarian
Fiona Younger A only High Hedonic
George Middle aged A and B Low Utilitarian
Harry Older None Low Utilitarian
Table I. Iona Middle aged A and B High Utilitarian
Profile of participants Jenna Younger B only Low Hedonic
 features (35.7 per cent), colour (12.1 per cent), space (10.7 per cent), layout (9.3 per cent), Atmospheric
lighting (8.2 per cent), sound (6.4 per cent), design features (5.6 per cent), comfort cues and their
features (3.6 per cent), employees (3.4 per cent) and crowding (2.0 per cent). It should be
noted that this is not a summary of every cue identified in the study. Some cues, like effect
temperature, smell and signage were discussed by some participants, but only briefly,
and they were also unable to identify any behavioural or affective outcomes as a result
of these cues, so they have been excluded from further discussion. Coverage is a metric 645
that can be used to help evaluate the importance of each category to participants, based
upon the assumption that they will spend relatively more time discussing the cues that
are more important to them. Although an approximate measure, it does highlight the
relative dominance of product displays features, which accounted for 35.7 per cent of all
discussion. Other cues that appeared to have had a moderate impact included the use of
colour, space (i.e. the size and emptiness of the environment), layout (i.e. the positioning
of products within space) and lighting. Cues that appeared to have a more minor impact
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included sound (i.e. music and noise within the environment), design features (i.e.
unique architectural and interior design features), comfort features (i.e. ergonomically
designed displays and furniture), employees (including positioning and presentation)
and crowding (i.e. the effect of too many customers in a given space). A comparison of
these ten categories with Turley and Millimans (2000) five general categories shows
robustness across studies.
Thematic analysis revealed two overarching categories of cues (factors) that
appeared to influence participants hedonic experience. The first of these attractive
stimuli were those cues that attracted attention, exciting the participant, and eliciting
approach behaviours. The specific cues included in this category were lighting, sound,
space, colour, layout, product display features and design features. The second factor
facilitating stimuli included those cues that were necessary in order to facilitate
product engagement. The specific cues included in this category were comfort features,
crowding, lighting, product display features and employees. The remainder of this
section will discuss the individual cues that contribute to each factor, detailing how the
hedonic experience was influenced by each cue.

Attractive stimuli
Lighting. The appropriate use of lighting, such as product spotlighting and dim
ambient lighting was effective in establishing a play mentality for participants and for
enhancing enjoyment. Dee, for example, said the following about Store A:
I quite like the lighting, its dim, it creates a mood where I want to play with things.
However, when lighting was not used effectively, which was often characterised by
floodlighting or levels that were too low or too high, products were perceived as
unexciting and cheap. For example, when discussing Store B, Chris noted:
The lighting in this store is pretty average. Its floodlit, its bright, nothing is spotlighted, it
doesnt prioritise any products over others. Its quite [. . .] business like I guess. Office. It just
feels cheap.
Most studies investigating lighting have found utilitarian connections (Areni and Kim,
1994; Summers and Hebert, 2001), but this finding extends the work of Babin et al.
(2003) in showing the hedonic usefulness of lighting.
 IJRDM Sound. The effective use of sound was categorised by medium volume music with
38,8 well spaced sound sources, and was successful in increasing interest and arousal.
When describing Store A, Bevan commented:
There is lots of sound coming from lots of different places [. . .] You want to go and find out
what is making noises.

646 The type of music played did not seem to have an effect on participants during the
protocol analysis, although many did mention this as an issue later on. Sound was also
found to have a negative effect if not used correctly. For example, within Store A, a whole
bank of stereos was switched on, instead of the usual single stereo, and the circular room
design exacerbated the situation by providing a sound shell effect. Iona observed:
It is very noisy right here, it is a bit like being bombarded. And everything is going [. . .] you
cant hear anything when everything is going at once.
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Turley and Chebat (2002) have suggested that music can play an important role in
providing entertainment for shoppers, though much of the literature on sounds in stores
is inconclusive or conflicting. Smith and Curnow (1966), for example, support the above
participant by reporting that shoppers spend less time in-store when the music is loud,
and dAstous (2000) categorises loud music as an irritant, whereas Herrington and
Capella (1996) found volume had no influence.
Space. Large open spaces made participants more comfortable with wandering
around and engaging with products. This was typified by Dee, who noted the following
about Store A:
I like the space, the way its all presented. It allows you to move, the open space is a good thing.
However, too much or too little space had negative effects. It appeared that the
perception of space adequacy was also related to levels of clutter in the store, which
was exemplified by Fiona in her observation about Store B:
Again, because the aisles are quite wide, Id skip the ones that are narrower. I wouldnt go
down this aisle because those boxes are in the way. I would avoid that.
To some extent the finding on space, and the discussion of layout below, is consistent
with previous research. The visual impression of the store as given by the physical
environment through the spatial layout and functionality, and the signage symbols and
artefacts (two of Bitners (1992) three composite dimensions of the service environment)
have been shown not to have support for affecting arousal and consequent approach
behaviour (Ang et al., 1997). Thang and Tan (2003), however, suggest that as part of a
visual package, incorporating decorations and display of merchandise, layout and ease
of movement can have a significant impact on store preference.
Colour. A limited colour pallet was more effective in drawing participants to
products and enhancing enjoyment than using a wide range of colours. When
commenting on Store A, Amy noted:
I like the way they have limited the colour palette. Youve only got black, red, and shades of
grey [. . .] It feels like a nice place to hang out, if you were interested in the product.
When many different colours were used all at once, participants did not always notice
them as easily, and their effectiveness at highlighting displays was severely reduced.
With regard to Store B, Eddy stated:
 I like these coloured signs, but throughout the store, well there are a lot of colours, you look Atmospheric
around and are overwhelmed by lots of colours. I know the theme colour is yellow, but it seems
crowded out by all these other colours. cues and their
effect
Previous research (Crowley, 1993; Babin et al., 2003) has tended to concentrate simply
on the effect of individual colours, so in keeping with the holistic theme, contemplation
of the spectrum of colours present is important in understanding how colour can impact
on the hedonic experience. 647
Layout. Participants did not seem to be positively influenced by layout in any way,
but many negative effects were cited. The positioning of the counter in a store seemed to
have a large impact on the creation of a play mentality. With regard to Store A, Chris
observed:
The counter in this store [. . .] people often stand behind it, and you come in and three people
are all sort of just standing behind it, like theyre are poised and ready to pounce, I often find it
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quite intimidating [. . .] But the areas where you have a bit of privacy [. . .] I was happy to
stand and look at those.
Layout also appeared to act as a signal of store intentions to participants, framing the
perceptions of the rest of the environment. The utilitarian, aisled layout of Store B
evoked many similar comments, with Bevan stating:
This store is very much go to the aisle, pick what you want, pay, leave. Its not supposed to be
a fun experience, its just supposed to get things done.
This, of course, is at odds with what almost every textbook on retailing will tell us.
Layout is seen as a positive means of guiding behaviour, but perhaps it is because this
guidance is normally contextualized as utilitarian (e.g. getting customers to move to
the rear of the store, getting them to move around the store) rather than hedonic that
this fails to be identified as a positive attractor cue.
Product display features. This was identified in the axial coding process as the most
discussed cue, and this seemed to occur due to the interrelatedness of product display
features with other cues, such as lighting, space and colour; all of which can attract
attention to a particular display. Displays also had some important standalone aspects
such as interactivity, with interactive displays and functioning products appearing to
encourage product engagement. For example, in Store A, Chris noted:
One thing I love about this store is that it is very hands on. You can come in, everything is
there for you to go and try.
When the spacing of products in a display became too small, it began to appear
cluttered, which had a negative effect, with participants stating they would tend to
avoid going into the store unless they had to. Amy was typical of many participants
when she stated:
I cant tell what is where in the clutter. There are these shelves everywhere, and although
there are signs, there is just too much to take in.
Design features. Store A demonstrated how design features can be used to encourage
the consumer into approaching and engaging with products. A curved design was used
on both the floor and ceiling to promote flow through the environment. Product
stations were accentuated by circles on floors and rings of lights lowered from
 IJRDM the ceiling. This integrated use of cues was highly effective on both the enjoyment and
38,8 physical movements of participants, with every participant commenting on the use of
curves. For example, Chris commented:
It is important to me that the floor is divided up into these different colours you know, places
to walk, places to stop. The floor is like a river, and thats where the people are moving. You
want people to come in and then stop and look at stuff.
648
Attractive stimuli are critical success factors in creating a hedonic experience. While we
can deconstruct each into individual stimuli and responses from the complete hedonic
experience, it is in combination that they facilitate the desired atmosphere. An
experiential store offering a hedonic shopping trip will still incorporate utilitarian or
facilitating stimuli as part of the overall holistic atmospherics, and we discuss these next.
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Facilitating stimuli
Comfort features. Comfort features are those parts of the store environment that are
designed to make a consumer comfortable during an experience. An example of this is
designing shelving to be appropriate for product use at standing height, which Store A
achieved as evidenced by the following quote from Amy:
Again, this [camera stand] is a comfortable height, you can put your elbows on it, its padded,
even that short girl there is ok on it but its good for tall people like me. There is a comfortable
feel.
Store B, however, was not effective in providing this for participants, and as a result
there was a detrimental effect on play mentality as the following comment from Fiona
suggests:
This row is too high, the bottom ones are ok, but the shelf half covers it and means Im not
interested.
Crowding. This cue was found to lower the feelings of enjoyment and pleasure for
many of the participants. For example, Jenna noted Store B was:
Too busy, when stores are really crowded I get a little bothered and claustrophobic, while Dee
stated I really dont like crowded places like this, it drives me nuts.
Machleit et al. (2000) point out the effect music can have on alleviating perceptual
crowding, and there is the concept that a crowd creates an atmosphere (e.g. at a rock
concert, at a sporting event), but outside of the crowd creating the feeling of excitement
at a store sale it is difficult to envisage crowding as a positive cue; it is most likely as an
anti-facilitating stimuli.
Lighting. As well as being part of the attractive stimuli factor, a certain level of
lighting is necessary to enable approach and engagement with products. This was
highlighted by an older participant (Amy) who noted in Store A that:
Actually that is something that a lot of people dont realise, but once you get into your mid
fifties, well I can read this but many of my friends wouldnt be able to. Im starting to get
trouble now reading the info that comes with a product.
This perspective fits with the Areni and Kim (1994) study examining the utilitarian
value of lighting, compared with the hedonic value discussed earlier.
 Product display features. As with lighting, product display features function as Atmospheric
attractive stimuli, but can also act as facilitating stimuli, which is apparent in the cues and their
literature (Hsee and LeClerc, 1998; Janiszewski, 1998). In this study, it seemed to involve a
negative effect on play mentality and pleasure, often caused by something going wrong in effect
an attempt at interactivity. Many participants encountered such obstacles, particularly in
Store B. The simplest and least damaging factors were display products that had run out
of batteries or were locked (in the case of computers). Other more serious problems with 649
interactive product displays had stronger effects upon participant play mentality and
affect, as Jennas experience in Store B suggests:
They do have cameras [. . .] which you cant use, maybe [alarm goes off] Argh! ok, I didnt do
anything!!! ok thats a bit worrying [. . .] [laughs, runs away] dont touch the cameras! I didnt
steal anything! That is quite irritating, so definitely doesnt encourage me to touch them again
[. . .] so not only did I not turn one on, but I set off the alarms.
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Employees. There was a nervous reaction to employee behaviour in some participants,

with some being quite avoidant of staff as the following statement by Chris suggests
with regard to Store A:
I feel that if I stood over there and looked at a product, they would come and talk with me, and
put me on the spot. I feel you kind of want to look, and then have someone come and talk to you
when youve been there for a while, or if you ask them.
Overall, facilitating stimuli appeared to exert a moderating influence on the effectiveness
of attractive stimuli in the creation of a hedonic retail experience. While the set of
attractive stimuli that were identified were all effective in attracting participants under
normal circumstances, when one of the facilitating stimuli was negative (in the case of
employees or crowding) or below a certain critical level (in the case of lighting or comfort),
the effectiveness of the attractive stimuli seemed to be diminished. Conversely, if
participants did not detect any flaws in the array of facilitating stimuli, attractive stimuli
functioned in a positive manner by creating the desired hedonic experience.

Participant characteristics
During the in-depth semi-structured interviews (which followed the protocol analysis),
participants were invited to talk about their involvement with the product categories
featured in the retailers they visited and their dominant shopping motivation (i.e.
utilitarian or hedonic). Both these areas were found to influence participants reactions
to the atmospheric cues they encountered, and a discussion of motivational orientation
and involvement follows.
Motivational orientation. Participants with a utilitarian shopping style expressed
they were less affected by the effective use of cues that serve to provide attraction to the
product, but were much more influenced by cues that enable interaction with the
product. The opposite applied to hedonically motivated consumers. The following
example details two participants reacting to the same attraction stimuli of lighting:
(Chris, hedonic) I really like the lighting, its more like a gallery, its lighting what needs
to be lit, not just flood lighting an area (Bevin, utilitarian) The lighting is very ambient.
Its not too bright. I suppose thats because there are loads of screens, you dont want the
glare. The differences between participants with hedonic motivations and those with
utilitarian motivations extended beyond the effectiveness of atmospheric cues, however.
Participants with utilitarian shopping motivations appeared to be mostly content in
 IJRDM either store. They typically recognised that the two stores were catering for different
38,8 purposes and adjusted their expectations for the utilitarian store. Hedonically motivated
participants, however, were alienated by the utilitarian environment, expressing a
strong dislike of such stores.
Involvement. Participants with high involvement levels appeared to be more
influenced by most atmospheric cues. This could potentially be a result of a lack of
650 motivation to engage with products when involvement is low. The following quote
typifies how Harry (low involvement) noted a well presented display, but declined to
approach it in Store A:
The video cameras [. . .] well it is handy, the display, because you can play with them, but it
doesnt excite me to come and do it. If you actually wanted one, it might be good.
Conversely, Chris (high involvement) in the same store observed:
These video cameras though, well there are cushioned benches, so it is a people space. You
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want to come in and you want to touch it because its soft and you can look at the products and
hold them and do something with them.
This suggests that despite the acknowledgement of the product displays attractiveness,
involvement with the product was needed to actually facilitate approach behaviours.

Discussion
This study contributes to the literature in several ways. First, the conceptual integration
of experiential consumption, hedonic consumption and atmospherics has been long
overdue, and this study has provided a theoretical link and applied it in real store
settings. Additionally, an holistic level examination of atmospheric cues was performed
by deconstructing from the outcome, which allowed for the development of a broader
understanding of atmospheric cues and their influence on the hedonic retail experience.
This holistic approach can be seen as more relevant to store designers and retail
marketers, because unlike an experimental design, an holistic examination allows for
the assessment of many atmospheric cues and their interactions simultaneously, and it
has helped identify those cues that are important in the creation of an hedonic
experience. This study also suggests that while the effective use of attractive stimuli like
interactive product displays or attractive display features are important, consumers
must be enabled through the use of facilitating stimuli such as comfort and lighting.
Moreover, the division of atmospheric cues into two factors has theoretical implications,
as these divisions have not been highlighted in previous integrative studies of
atmospheric cues (Turley and Milliman, 2000).
Two participant attributes were also found to have a significant moderating effect
on the perception of atmospherics. Involvement was found to increase participants
responsiveness to atmospheric cues. The motivational orientation of participants also
had an effect. In sum, utilitarian participants were mostly content in both the hedonic
and utilitarian stores, but hedonic consumers were alienated by the harsher utilitarian
environment, professing extreme dislike for the atmospheric cues present. This
research reinforces the importance of manipulating atmospherics, especially when
attempting to create a hedonic experience, or if the customer base is hedonic in nature.
In this regard, the findings of this study support Kaltcheva and Weitz (2006), who found
that motivational orientation plays an important role in the way consumers process
environmental cues in a retail store.
 Implications Atmospheric
By understanding the effects of atmospheric cues, retailers can mould their marketing cues and their
efforts to create a positive shopping experience (dAstous, 2000). This study provides a
categorisation of atmospheric cues, providing factors that shop designers can be aware effect
of when creating a store with the hedonic experience in mind. Retailers should also be
aware of the effects of employees on consumers. It was evident that employees can act
as an inhibiting factor in the generation of a play mentality, as many of the participants 651
felt nervous interacting with products while being watched. Thus, consideration should
be given to the location of employees when designing a retail store. Finally, retailers
who offer utilitarian shopping environments must also recognise the risk of isolating
hedonic consumers. Utilitarian consumers were happy in an hedonic environment, but a
harsh utilitarian environment evoked strong negative reactions from hedonically
motivated participants.
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Limitations
Only one category of stores was used to in this study, and although consumer
electronics stores were selected because of a high degree of relevance to a broad range of
consumers, the findings have the potential to be idiosyncratic to the stores used in this
study. Additionally, due to time constraints, a pair of stores were used to assess cue
differences between stores focusing on providing an hedonic experience and stores
focusing on utilitarian value. Using several pairs of stores across industries or using a
spectrum of stores may be beneficial. Finally, as the data collection took place over a
period of several days, there were slight variances in the store environments over time,
and not all participants experienced exactly the same environment.

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Corresponding author
Paul W. Ballantine can be contacted at: paul.ballantine@canterbury.ac.nz

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