September 20, 2006--And They Used to Study the Kwakiutl

Before it became politically incorrect, anthropologists engaged in "field work" among American Indians and other Indigenous Peoples. More recently this kind of ethnographic research has taken on the feeling of cultural imperialism--it no longer seems appropriate for an outsider, say a German-American Jew such as Franz Boas, to roam among and study the Kwakiutl of the Pacific Northwest.

But the field of anthropology is still booming, in part because anthropologists in the Pacific Northwest are now doing field work in more accommodating places. Places such as OfficeMax. They do so in order to help lure shoppers into buying more index dividers and staple machines.

And of course the living conditions and remuneration for the anthropologists are much, much better.

The NY Times reports about one such study—watching over the shoulder of a sort of anthropologist of shopping as she observed and diagramed how a male shopper first picked up a shopping bag and then proceeded to the pen display. She made a schematic drawing of every step he took, which displays he lingered over, and noted how unusual it was for a man to use the OfficeMax-supplied canvas shopping bag. They appear to be gendered items. (Article lined below.)

OfficeMax is very happy with what was discovered—“Scientifically understanding how customers interact with our stores can make a big difference.” Paco Underhill, CEO of the firm OfficeMax hired to do the study is the author of Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping. To give you an insight about the filed of science he is developing, note how he expounds on the subject of “butt brushing”—he has found that if a store’s aisles are two narrow and people thus brush up against each other when negotiating them, they tend to leave the store without buying anything.

Obviously not a good thing--though I can think of reasons why brushing the right butt might make it appealing for me to remain in the store—though maybe not to shop.

And so, for this and other reasons OfficeMax has been redesigning how it lays out its aisles, breaking up the familiar grid and replacing it with what they call a “racetrack,” where the main wide aisle (note, alas, the wideness) loops around the store, dividing it into “comfort zones” where no butting can possibly occur, which in turn leads to specific areas where “destination products” are on display—all things that are needed for filing or where you can find expensive electronic gadgetry.

It works! Electronic cash register data reveal increases in sales of related office products. Customers, I imagine, no longer just buy the staple machine, they also buy staples.

And all poor Franz Boas ever did was study the Kwakiutl’s potlatch ceremonies where individuals effectively bankrupted themselves by giving away everything they owned in order to appear more prosperous than their neighbors. Who ever heard of anything as crazy at that?