This is for Venture Lab Crash Course of Creativity Assignment #2 Observation Lab 2012.10.30

1. Venture Lab
Crash Course on Creativity
Observation Lab
Eugene Chen
2012.10.28
1

2. Introduction
Six stores were observed and reviewed in
this report:
• Best Buy (Sunnyvale, CA)
• Ariake Sushi (Sunnyvale, CA)
• Rite Aid (Sunnyvale, CA)
• Curry House (Cupertino, CA)
• Costco Wholesale (Sunnyvale, CA)
• Trader Joe’s (Los Altos, CA)
2

3. Best Buy (1/8)
• Front door opens automatically when customer
walks in – a good sign of “Welcome”!
• Commercial sign (“Call of Duty”) is easy to see.
3

4. Best Buy (2/8)
• First thing you notice is a lot of recycle containers – this
shows Best Buy is serious about environmental protection.
• They put an air freshener next to containers because some
recycled material may be stinky – very thoughtful !
4

5. Best Buy (3/8)
• The whole store is divided by product categories. Large blue
circular signs can guide customers to find what they want
easily.
• The store has a high ceiling so it provides a spacious feeling.
5

6. Best Buy (4/8)
• After you walk in thru the front
door, a straight pathway leads
you to the middle of the store.
Products are arranged on the
sides of pathway, and more
popular ones are at the end of
the pathway (e.g. video
game, laptop, tablet, etc.)
• A lot of staff walk around
trying to help customers.
However, after I walked
around for 20 min, finally one
staff came forward to offer
help to me.
6

7. Best Buy (5/8)
• Magnolia Home
Theater section is a
separate segment
which is located at
the corner of the
store. Its design is
inconsistent with the
rest of the store.
• This arrangement is
not working well as
very few customers
walk into this
segment.
7

8. Best Buy (6/8)
• Multiple brands of the same product (e.g. tablet) are
displayed on the same table side by side. Product spec info
is listed next to the product.
• However, it fails to provide guidance info to help customers
to make purchase decision.
8

9. Best Buy (7/8)
• Some manufacturers put their own product demo booths right
in the middle of the store. It is obvious the store is used as a
product show case for any manufacturer who is willing to pay
for the space.
9

10. Best Buy (8/8)
• A lot of wall space is used to showcase different models of flat screen
TV. It impresses customers with its large number of product selections.
• But it fails to think ahead for customers what kind of value-proposition is
best from customer’s point of view.
• More customers looking around but few are actually making purchases.
10

11. Ariake Sushi (1/6)
• It is located in the center of a shopping plaza. Its sign is in large red
text with white background, so it is easy to see from a distance.
• Its front door is always open during business hours to welcome
customers.
11

12. Ariake Sushi (2/6)
• The first thing you see after walk-in is a long sushi boat set up.
It is easy for staff to welcome customers, and it creates a
friendly environment for customers to sit down and start to eat.
• It puts three flat screen TVs on the wall (two are shown in this
photo) so customers will not feel boring while they wait for the
food.
12

13. Ariake Sushi (3/6)
• The whole wall is covered with mirrors. Even the pillar is covered
with mirrors too. This makes the small restaurant look spacious
and brighter.
• They used purple color to paint the top of the sushi boat area and
it gives a contemporary touch, and also makes a statement that
this is not an old-fashion style Japanese restaurant.
13

14. Ariake Sushi (4/6)
• The sushi dishes have a clear price tagging
system. Customers can consider the price and
value before making purchase selection.
14

15. Ariake Sushi (5/6)
• Wasabi and sliced ginger are on the table for the
convenience of customers. Not a lot Japanese
restaurants provide unlimited wasabi and ginger
to customers like Ariake. It’s another way to show
they care about customer satisfaction.
15

16. Ariake Sushi (6/6)
• They created a different selection of sushi rolls, and gave them
interesting names like “I miss U”, “Crazy”, “1+1” and “Oh! Yes”. They
also made a large display board with pictures and names of their
special sushi rolls. Customers who are curious about these interesting
sushi names will order them from the restaurant.
• Because of its uniqueness menu and friendly services, this restaurant
is always full of customers.
16

17. Rite Aid (1/6)
• This large Rite Aid drug store is located on a busy Sunnyvale street
(El Camino Real). Its sign is clear and can easily be seen when you
drive by the store.
• It has an automatic front door and it opens whenever someone
walks by it.
17

18. Rite Aid (2/6)
• It has so much space inside it’s almost as large as a Walmart store.
• However, there are very few staff, and the whole store looks quite
empty.
• Even so, the whole store is very organized and clean.
18

19. Rite Aid (3/6)
• The way products are displayed in the empty
space can make other drug stores very jealous.
19

20. Rite Aid (4/6)
• In general, this store is well maintained. However, I found a
hole on the pillar (above the fire extinguisher). It’s in the
middle of the walkway, so it’s hard to believe it was missed
by the store manager.
20

21. Rite Aid (5/6)
• Because it has so much space
inside this store, there is a
whole section used for alcohol
drinks. It’s almost like a small
liquor store.
• However, I only saw one
customer in this area when I
visited the store.
21

22. Rite Aid (6/6)
• The Photo Finishing section has lots of products but no
customer or staff. As fewer people want to develop photos
now, this section of the store is never converted to other
service or product which customers really need. Unfortunately,
it’s a lot of wasted shelf space and business opportunities.
22

23. Curry House (1/6)
• This Japanese style restaurant is located on the first floor of a three
story building, and it’s on a busy business street in Cupertino. The
second and third floors are for residential use.
• Even though there are not lots of free parking space around, this
restaurant is always crowded.
23

24. Curry House (2/6)
• Its front door is well decorated. The plastic meal samples can be seen thru clear
glass windows on both sides of the front door.
• Decoration of the reception waiting area can also be clearly seen from the
outside.
• The “Open Hour” sign is posted on the front door to provide detail information of
its business hours.
24

25. Curry House (3/6)
• The decoration style of waiting area is simple and elegant. It is
telling customers what it sells here is more than food. It is selling
artistic tasty food.
• A photo collection of all the other Curry House restaurants tells a
story of its background without using words.
25

26. Curry House (4/6)
• The interior design is also showing its artistic style.
• The curvy ceiling design and hanging lamps deliver a consistent
message with the rest of decoration.
• Ceramic tiles are used int eh reception area, while hard wood
floor is used for the dining area. This represents the intention to
make the dining area a unique and separate space.
26

27. Curry House (5/6)
• The specialty of this restaurant is its (curry) sauce and
seasoning. This message is visible everywhere inside
the restaurant. This means the management knows
where its strength is and continues to keep its leading
position in this area. 27

28. Curry House (6/6)
• The uniform of
waiters and
waitresses is white
shirt, black pants,
plus a tie. At first
glance, this seems
inconsistent with its
contemporary
artistic style. But
actually it
represents
Japanese style
sincerity to
customer service.
28

29. Costco Wholesale (1/6)
• This Costco Wholestore is in the middle of a busy
section of Sunnyvale. Its front door is always wide
open and always crowded year round.
29

30. Costco Wholesale (2/6)
• The first thing you see when you walk in to the store is an
array of flat screen TVs. The actual products are under the
display unit so customers can take it into the shopping cart
as soon as the purchase decision is made. This is very
different from the Best Buy store.
30

31. Costco Wholesale (3/6)
• The most amazing thing
about Costco is they
can commoditize
boutique store products
like jewelry and music
instruments.
Traditionally these types
of product require
guidance from specially
trained salesperson. But
Costco can overcome
this barrier and sell
them on the un-staffed
shop floor.
31

32. Costco Wholesale (4/6)
• Customers can also
select books and
clothing without any
sales guidance. As
customers know more
what they want, more
things can be
commoditized.
32

33. Costco Wholesale (5/6)
• When large number of product
selections are presented,
labeling is a challenge. Costco
separates the labels and
products so customers have
to do more work to match
them.
33

34. Costco Wholesale (6/6)
• There is always some good idea to save energy. Costco
uses ceiling windows to brighten the interior of the
building so more energy cost can be saved.
34

35. Trader Joe’s (1/6)
• This Trader Joe’s market is located at an not-
so-busy intersection of Los Altos and
Cupertino, CA. However, it always has many
customers shopping there year round.
35

36. Trader Joe’s (2/6)
• Decoration inside the store is always so colorful and
full of seasonal messages. Even though it has many
branch stores around, its decoration makes
customers feel like each store is individually designed
and decorated.
36

37. Trader Joe’s (3/6)
• Messages for customers are very clear and easy to understand:
“Baked Today..” and “Today’s Coffee” – emphasizes the
products are freshly made for customers (vs. the other mass-
production products markets which you are not sure how long
the products have been on the shelves).
37

38. Trader Joe’s (4/6)
• Decorations throughout the store are consistent. The
painting on the wall and the bamboo pillar (in the
middle of the walkway) are examples how the
decorator paid attention to the details.
38

39. Trader Joe’s (5/6)
• Trader Joe’s provides guidance to help customers make
purchasing decision. Wine product labeling is an example. Store
manager’s review comments are written on the labels. This is
very different from the other retail stores I reviewed above.
39

40. Trader Joe’s (6/6)
• Trader Joe’s is never afraid to be different. The left
picture is their specialty products, and the right picture
is an old-fashion bell which they still use it for internal
communication.
40

41. Conclusion
• I am glad I learned so much from this assignment ! During
the observation of these stores, I noticed so many things
which I did not pay attention to before. I spent about 10
hours on this assignment, and I think the time was worth
spending!
• The amazing part of this assignment is to see stores with
totally different styles can both be successful. For example,
Costco Wholesales can convert almost everything into
commodities, while Trader Joe’s can turn commodities into
specialty products! Each one of them found a successful
business model and makes it shine.
• From these successful business examples I have learned
there is more than one formula of success. If we continue
to be creative when we face challenges, eventually we
shall be able to find a solution which can lead to success.
41

42. The End
(Thanks for viewing)
42