Imagine the scene. It's midday in a busy discount supermarket and I'm wandering the aisles looking for inspiration for the evening meal. Easily distracted as I am, I come across a prominently displayed box of shower gel and stop to look. Okay, it's not going to help me decide what to buy for dinner, but it was a brief respite from the intense intellectual activity. The price seems really good; 1 litre priced at a 250ml bottle. Not bad. I forget the groceries and pull over to the side to take a better look. There must be a catch somewhere, the product was ridiculously cheap.
On the opposite side of the display I observe another housewife with her trolley eying up the bottles. Her face displays the same thought processes that are going through my mind: shall I buy a bottle, or not? Unable to decide, she picks up a random bottle from the box and flips the top in order to smell the contents. Sniff, sniff and she wrinkles her nose. She then offers the bottle for me to smell. I lean forward and inhale.
Yuck!
"It smells just like washing up liquid," I opine.
"You're right." The other lady smiles, returns the bottle to the box with its friends and continues pushing her trolley along the aisles. I, too, follow my own path.
My short interlude provided no inspiration for the 'dinner dilemma' but it did give me an insight into the philosophy behind effective retailing.
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