The role of town centre research

Cathy Hart & Fiona Ellis-Chadwick

Cathy Hart

School of Business

& Economics

Town Centres Research Group

• TC Customer Experience research – 3 funded

empirical studies (ESRC, project partners)

• National and retail partners – BRC, ACS, Argos,

Boots, Loughborough BID

• Local town centre partners – Borough Council,

County Council & individual survey towns.

• Location analytics partners – Indestinate, Elephant

Wifi.

• Digital High Street research – assessing

infrastructure, capabilities, online presence.

Are consumers deserting the high street?

▪ “Footfall sees sharpest decline in 4 years”

▪ Consumers seeking physical, social and

leisure experiences “Transactions for

leisure and travel activities doubled in

the last 12 months” (Deloitte 2016)

▪ Experiences translate into dwell time &

spend;

▪ Need for physical stores: 89% of retail

transactions ‘touch’ a bricks and mortar

store (physical sales, click & collect,

showrooming)

▪ Footfall only part of the picture.

How do they use town centres?

Consumer or consuming data?

• Reported in physical, aggregate terms e.g. mass footfall

• What happens beyond the store?

• Where / when does the town visit start or end?

• What limits length of physical

town centre journeys?

• What influences in town behaviour?

• Where does digital fit in?

“High streets must adapt to meet the

changing needs of today’s consumers.”UK High Streets Minister

Consumer behaviour

?

High street

journey data

?

Footfall data

Store data

Catchment data

What influences town centre behaviour?

Perception of town centre

image

Assessment of town centre attractiveness

Choice of location

(i) Time spent in the town centre

(ii) Expenditure in the town centre

(iii) Repeat visits

Consumers provide the ‘glue’

that makes towns attractive

Importance of consumer perceptions

Studies Method Purpose

Study 1 Focus groups

54 respondents

Explore and define town

centre customer experience

(TCCX)

Study 2 Online diaries

1,869 entries

Track detailed TCCX

activities over 4 week period

Study 3 Weekly

questionnaire 445 incident

entries

Identify the critical incidents

occurring during the TCCX

Study 4 Telephone

interviewsn= 153

Identify relative importance

of town centre touch points

Study 5 Consumer

surveyn=1,530

Develop and test scale for

a TCCX consumer tool

Phase 1: Exploratory

• 200 consumers

• 6 Town CentresSwindon

Huddersfield

Watford

Loughborough

Bury St Edmunds

Sandbach

Phase 2: Confirmatory

• 1,500 consumers

• 10 Town Centres

Method of Analysis:

Content analysis

Research methods

% of visits recorded during 4-week period (online consumer ‘diary’)

31.84%

28.25%

14.39% 12.84%

8.29%

4.39%

This town centre is the closest to

where I live, I know where to park

and where all the shops are

WHY that town?

1. Local / close to

home

2. Convenient / easy

to get to

3. Close to work

4. Has everything I

need

I looked at clothes online but there was

so much to look at I thought it would be

easier to go to the shop and look

There are lots of little

independent shops so you

can buy one off gifts.

You've got 2 separate

markets plus the shopping

centre so it caters for all

Where do consumers shop?

How much time / money do they spend?

£55.86 41.80

11.18

£56.5158.74

14.53

98

47

20

38

73

64

Mean spend

Ave time spent

Average £spend and time spent (mins) per visit (during 4-week period)

Ease of access, ease of information.

If you can find out what's happening

on your phone then you are much

more likely to do it.

There are lots of road works on my route

to town, had I known I may have bought

online

I spend probably 2 or 3 hours walking round

the different shops and seeing what I like

and what not and then see a film or we have

something to eat

Town centres: part of the experience

or retail location?“Wanting to go into town is

different from wanting or

needing to shop. It is about

an experience” (Gehl 2010)

Town centre journey experiences

Depending on my reason for going to

the Town Centre I would park in the

relevant car park nearest to the store I

needed

If some of the empty properties

down the side streets were

occupied I would change my route.

I try to avoid the main route

because of traffic

The town centre isn't well signposted, so you don't

know what shops are available. There are a lot of

shops at the back of the High Street - on side

streets which you could be made more aware of.

Town centre routes

are habitual…

Loughborough Town Centre

December 2012

Tracking consumer activity in town

Town centre activity – beyond retail

Loughborough Town Centre

December 2015

Customer journeys include touch points…

Functional Touch Points (FTP) satisfy practical purposes, convenience, efficiency

▪ Stores and products – range and availability

▪ Access and layout – transport links & movement

▪ Parking – pricing, convenience and space

▪ Information – appropriate and up to date

Experiential Touch Points (ETP) engage senses, feelings, emotions

▪ Customer service – encourages / deters customers return

▪ Social Interaction - other people enhances experience

▪ Savings / bargains – disappointed if charged unfairly

▪ Special events – increase desire to shop

▪ Refreshments / eating out – increase dwell time

▪ Atmosphere – generates sensory reactions

▪ Markets – attract / deter consumers

Larger towns

performed better

on functional touch

points…

Smaller towns out

performed larger

towns for

experiential touch

points

The value of social and leisure

experiences in towns

Average spend / time spent by

shoppers taking refreshments

Average spend / time per visit

when shopping with others

Experiences impact town centre performance

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

FTPs – total respondent scores

for Functional Touch Points

ETPs – total respondent scores

for Experiential Touch Points

Above average

Below average

ETPs

FTPs

ETPs

FTPs Access

Consumer behaviour(desire to stay, loyalty, future visits & word of mouth)

Town centre performance

AtmosphereSpecial

events

Customer

service

Savings &

Bargains

Social

interaction

Refreshments &

Entertainment

Stores

Markets

LayoutProducts Parking

Experiential touch

points add value to

town experiences

Functional

touch points

must perform

as expected

How to influence & shape town centre

behaviour?✓ Understand the motivators and barriers for your towns to encourage

a healthy town centre relationship

✓ Identify where your customers begin / end their journeys – where are

the decision points?

✓ Identify the touch points that drive customer satisfaction

✓ Decrease customer pain points e.g. functional hassle of access and

parking, stock availability etc.

✓ Create & promote joined up experiences – convert a functional trip to

an experiential visit (using social media, marketing communications)

✓ Influence attraction, drive footfall and dwell time via digital tools

Next steps…

• Measuring the TCCX

• Integrating digital in TCCX

• Building a Place Analysis Tool

Town centre analytics: Journey mapping

Town centre Wifi – capture, understand, engage customers

We are building a Place

Analysis Tool to measure: SITE

Skills

InfrastructureTown Attractiveness

Engagement

Founding research Warwickshire and

Leicestershire, has produced insights of

each dimension – as county, town and

street level.

Next steps:

More places further trials - improving access

to information for place managers.

Scaling Up- building the SITE Tool for greater

reach to a wider number of participating towns

and cities.

Improving Effectiveness – through testing of

the importance of each of the dimensions and

individual variables which form the SITE

Analysis Engine.

Automation – potential for universal access to

place managers through a web-based portal.

Dr Fiona Ellis-Chadwick, Index Development Team Project Lead

Thank you! For further information….

Town Centre Customer Experience:

CONTACT: Dr Cathy Hart

School of Business & Economics

c.a.hart@lboro.ac.uk

Download our Phase 1 Project Research Report:

http://thegreatbritishhighstreet.co.uk/pdf/GBHS-The-

Customer-Experience-of-Town-Centres.pdf?2

The Place Analysis Tool, SITE:

CONTACT: Dr Fiona Ellis-Chadwick

School of Business & Economics

F.E.Ellis-Chadwick@lboro.ac.uk

Town centre Wifi information: Elephant Wifihttp://www.elephantwifi.co.uk/ contact Dan Coombs