••• consumer psychology
Too anxious to clean house?
Add housecleaning to the list of things for Americans to get stressed about. A poll of 2,000 U.S. adults commissioned by cleaning-product company Casabella and conducted by OnePoll found that 90% of those surveyed say they get anxious cleaning their home.
The top five most agita-inducing cleaning tasks involve floors (54%), carpets and rugs (52%), refrigerators (52%), windows (50%) and dishwashers (48%). It's so bad that 49% admit to “always” or “often” pretending to not see a mess so someone else can clean it instead.
When they do finally get around to it, roughly three-quarters of respondents (72%) admit they’re not as thorough as they should be when it’s time to clean, and areas of their home will often go neglected because they’re either too hard to reach (44%), are difficult to clean (39%) or they don’t have the time to clean (38%).
The average person’s home only lasts 12 days after being cleaned before it starts to get dirty again, making a plea for daily cleaning. A large majority (84%) felt confident in their abilities to tell whether something in their home is truly clean or not – claiming their home only feels clean once it lacks dirt particles (60%), smells sanitized (58%) and lacks stains (52%).
••• shopper insights
‘Can I get a price check in the ointment aisle?’
It’s an age-old law of marketing that friendly customer service is a sure way to boost your business. But shoppers who are buying embarrassing products don’t necessarily want a smiling face or pleasant small talk.
A University of British Columbia Sauder School of Business study shows that when people are making a potentially awkward purchase, they choose self-checkout – or failing that, hope for a no-nonsense, robotic human cashier.
For the study in the Journal of Marketing Research (“How consumers respond to embarrassing service encounters: A dehumanization perspective”), the authors studied data of actual purchase behavior in grocery stores and observed whether customers prefer self-checkout or a human cashier when purchasing products such as condoms or menstrual pads.
The findings were similar across genders and challenge the long-held belief that building rapport with customers should be the top priority for service employees. So what should pharmacy workers and other retail staff do when a customer sets that tube of hemorrhoid cream on the counter? Skip the small talk and get them out the door. “They should be mindful of the purchases people are making and if the person is avoiding eye contact and the product they are buying is one that might be embarrassing for them, don’t try to create a connection,” says study co-author JoAndrea Hoegg.