customers' experience in restaurants' environments

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perception of a restaurant. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) Customers' variety of personal traits and cultural backgrounds are two of the main factors to be considered ...
CUSTOMERS’ EXPERIENCE IN RESTAURANTS’ ENVIRONMENTS: PROXEMICS, EMOTIONS AND PERCEPTION OF SPACE AS DESIGN ISSUES Gussago E.

________________________________________________________________________________ ABSTRACT “Thousands of experiences teach us that space communicates” (E.T. Hall, 1990). Previous studies suggest that personal space in relation with others conditions individuals’ behaviours, reactions, emotions and unconscious choices within a social context or environment. In foodservice and eating experience these factors relapse on customers’ psychology and their relationship with food, having inevitable influences on their perception of a restaurant. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) Customers’ variety of personal traits and cultural backgrounds are two of the main factors to be considered when designing a restaurant, especially if located in a big city, because the number of foreign citizens is higher and a cultural mix is guaranteed. (P. Hunsaker and T. Alessandra, 2008) Therefore, what follows is an overview of the environmental psychology literature as it relates to personal space, visual perception, and culture, with an emphasis on interior and experience design strategies that may be considered by the foodservice industry.

LITERATURE REVIEW PROXEMICS IN RESTAURANTS’ ENVIRONMENTS Proxemics is defined as the study of the cultural, behavioural, and sociological aspects of spatial distances between individuals. Introduced by anthropologist Edward T. Hall in the 1960s, the theory initially emerged from studies of animal behaviour conducted in the 19th and early 20th centuries and then developed basing on observation of humans in social situations. In his book, The Silent Language, Edward Hall outlined the following distance classification behind proxemics theory that has been explained and translated in the context of a restaurant environment: • Public distance - 12 feet and beyond: the feeling of distance perceived when entering a high ceilinged restaurant or a large open lobby. • Social distance - 4 feet to 12 feet: customers feel social distance when they watch the television screen above a bar. • Personal distance - 18 inches to 4 feet: personal distance usually occurs between people who are family members or close friends. The closer the people can comfortably stand while interacting can be an indicator of the intimacy of the relationship. This distance in a restaurant is experienced when speaking across the table to dining companions. • Intimate distance - physical contact to 18 inches: this level of distance often indicates a closer relationship or great comfort between individuals. We talk about intimate distance in a restaurant context when one is close enough to touch a dining companion, as when seated side by side on a banquette. It is the sometimes crowded feeling when a diner’s chair is bumped by passing service staff. (R. S. Baraban, 1989) From studies held through all 20th century, it has proven that humans are territorial animals as they instinctively possess and defend space as their own property. This helps regulate social interaction. As soon as these boundaries are invaded, the individual feels uncomfortable and unconscious dynamics and behaviour start manifesting. Two actions can be possible: create new boundaries literally moving the personal space somewhere else e.g. if someone gets too close, we instinctively distance our body from them, or defend the territory attacking the invader e.g. in extreme situations, if

someone gets too close we would push them away. This unconsciously happens because having sufficient personal territory allows us to regulate our contact with others, thus ensuring both privacy and security (Proshansky, 1970). In the food service context, dynamics are different and perhaps much more complicated because this is where psychology and humans’ relationship with food come into play. Research in the field of environmental psychology suggests that customers’ perceptions and behaviours can be significantly influenced by the location and configuration of the seats they occupy. In general, seat spacing, location, and configuration have all been found to have a profound impact on behaviour. Psychology is directly connected with food consumption: negative emotions, caused by stressful situations, can affect the level of appetite and consequently, the amount of food ordered by a customer. (K. Appleton, 2014) For instance, if someone feels uncomfortable in an overly crowded restaurant, they could unconsciously feel like they want to eat less than they expected, because of reduction of appetite. They would also buy less food, spend less money, and leave with a negative impression about the restaurant. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) Appetite and brain are closely connected that a negative emotion or perception can influence consumption choices and costumers’ behaviour. Eating too close to strangers could make one feel uncomfortable because he or she would unconsciously try to adjust their personal space with no success most of the time. (Proshansky, 1970) This would make them want to move somewhere else and perhaps not choose that restaurant again in the future. Proxemics is the main factor in this kind of situations together with privacy. If an individual feels that they have a lack of privacy in a public situation, their stress level generally goes up (G.W. Evans and R.B. Howard, 1973) and it is likely that their satisfaction with their experience will decrease. Close proximity, can be overstimulating and stressful if the person nearby is not an intimate of ours, and we will seek ways to reduce our discomfort by either increasing our personal space when conditions allow or by leaving the environment as soon as possible. Moreover, privacy is not only about body space and personal boundaries, because sounds and speaking come into play. (E. Sundstrom, 1982) For instance, when someone dining by themselves has to speak on the phone and strangers are too close, he or she would feel compelled to stand up and have the conversation somewhere else. The same situation happens when a couple or a group of friends are dining together and other customers are too close to them, as they may not feel free to talk about personal facts or details. They would also get unconsciously stressed and perhaps leave the restaurant with a negative feeling. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004)

COEXISTENCE OF DIFFERENT CULTURES First of all it is necessary to define the meaning of culture in the context of this research. The word culture will be used to indicate “a fuzzy set of attitudes, beliefs, behavioural norms, basic assumptions and values that are shared by a group of people, and that influence each member’s behaviour and their interpretations of the meaning of other people’s behaviour” (Joosse, 2016); and also “the characteristic features of everyday existence shared by people in a place or time” (Oxford English Dictionary, 2017). In order to summarize intercultural similarities as well as intercultural differences, 10 clusters of culture have been identified by GLOBE (Global Leadership & Organizational Behaviour Effectiveness) project: South Asia, Anglo, Arab, Germanic Europe, Latin Europe, Eastern Europe, Confucian Asia, Latin America, Sub-Sahara Africa, and Nordic Europe. (R. House, P. J. Hanges, 2003) The last several decades have seen tremendous change in a multitude of aspects affecting the way we perceive our own culture and other cultures, since the ‘global village’ is moving closer to becoming a place where sharing space with other individuals having different cultural backgrounds is absolutely part of ordinary life. (D. Massey - 2010) As a consequence, this fact affects all public space designs, restaurants included. Thus, in this particular field of public design, it is crucial to consider the differences, and their consequences, between contact cultures and noncontact cultures. A contact culture is when there are cultural groups in which people tend to stand close together and touch frequently when they interact together. A noncontact culture is when cultural groups tend to maintain more space and often less touch than contact cultures (M. L. Knapp, 1992). Some examples of the former would include Latin America, Arab and Latin Europe with the Arab being the highest contact. Some examples of the latter would include Anglo, Germanic Europe and the Confucian Asia. This distinction is crucial to consider when designing the layout of a restaurant. In many cases tables are positioned as closely to each other as code allows maximizing the number of

tables the space can hold to increase profitability; however, it is proved that this strategy has a negative impact on guests’ perceptions (Smithers, 2010), especially when their cultural background is noncontact oriented. DEFINITIONS OF EXPERIENCE IN HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY After understanding what proxemics means and which effects may have on customers that belong to different cultures, it is useful to think in a bigger scale and investigate on the totality of emotions that a customer may feel when experiencing a restaurant. Proxemics and psychology are directly connected with all the elements regarding the customers experience and consequently their satisfaction. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) The purpose of this research is to summarize and analyse the main strategies and basic elements that design has at its disposal for the customers to feel comfortable and satisfied. Experience is sometimes thought as something extraordinary, defined, that goes beyond imagination (E.J. Arnould, L.L. Price, 2003) but, when considering restaurant environments, it may simply indicate “the mix of emotions and impressions a customer feel during their dinner”. Extraordinary, active and stretch experiences can sometimes distract the customer from the tasting of the food which is not always positive. (Tynan, McKechnie, Hartly, 2014) In fact, what is investigate in this research is the combination of impressions, feelings, emotions, thoughts, behaviours, perceptions and senses stimulations that compose a customer’s experience in an ordinary restaurant. Also to be taken into account is the importance of clues of quality in experience design, because they derive from people and tangibles, and communicate important values or mission of an organization, which are fundamental for marketing and consequently for the revenue. (Berry, Carbone, Haeckel, 2002) That is why it is of the utmost importance for every restaurant manager to keep in mind the main values that are the base of the food service. A good point of start might be to consider the nature of hospitableness, which means “hospitality as behaviour and experience”. (O'Connor, 2005) The Oxford English Dictionary defines hospitality as “the friendly and generous reception of guests or strangers”, and the Chambers English Dictionary defines it as “entertaining strangers and guests kindly and without reward, showing kindness, generous, bountiful”. Therefore, when designing a restaurant, it is important to remember that customers firstly need to feel comfortable in the environment, and designers have to be extremely empathic to reach this goal. (D. Leyonard, J.F. Rayport, 1997) Every emotion may be crucial for the customer’s impression and consequently their choice about the restaurant. Properly executed experiences will encourage loyalty not only through a functional design but also by creating emotional connection through engaging, compelling, and consistent context. (M.E. Pullman, M.A. Gross, 2004) According to Bitner (1990), context is the “service-scape” and describes what a restaurant should consider in terms of environmental dimensions, customers responses (cognitive, emotional, and physiological), and their behaviours including staying longer, expressing commitment and loyalty, purchasing, and carrying out the aim of the restaurant.

CONTEXT AND CUSTOMERS’ EXPERIENCE AS DESIGN TOOLS (ESSAY) Context is the main concern for experience design and management. Gupta and Vajic (1999) define context as the physical and relational setting where the customer consumes the service and everything that the customer interacts within that setting. An appropriately stimulating context should encourage what Mehrabian and Russell (1974) call approach behaviours, which include entering an environment, spending time there, and making purchases. The link between stimulation and approach behaviours can be seen when factoring in a bland restaurant design: unless there is an exceptional reason to stay, customers are likely to choose another restaurant. And this is where design plays a fundamental role. Researchers have identified direct links between stimulation, approach behaviour, and satisfaction. (J. Wirtz, A.S. Mattila, R.L.P. Tan, 2000) If an environment offers the right amount of stimulation, and consequently positive impressions and emotions for its customers, they are more likely to be satisfied and demonstrate approach behaviours that increase revenue, such as patronizing the restaurant in the first place or increasing their spending once they are there. (A.S. Mattila and J. Wirtz, 2006) The main elements that determine customers’ impressions, from the very beginning till the end of their experience, are the distance between them and strangers, the distance between them and their partners and the context, which includes atmosphere and quality of service. The social environment is an important dimension of the service-scape because people within a physically built environment can shape and influence the physical space and its impact (Baker, Grewal, & Parasuraman, 1994). Often,

when designers create restaurant dining areas, the tables arrangement is typically planned to maximize the number of seats that can be accommodated in a given space while allowing adequate room for service. Some veteran restaurateurs may be able to “size up” a room and determine a seating plan intuitively just by walking through the space, based primarily on their own experience. However, research in the field of environmental psychology suggests that customers’ perceptions and behaviours can be significantly influenced by the location and configuration of the seats they occupy. (K. A. Robson, 2002) An understanding of how seat location and table configuration can impact consumer behaviour in a range of cultures may assist the foodservice operator in creating environments that enhance the dining experience while helping to maximize opportunities for generating revenue. THE IMPORTANCE OF TABLES ARRANGEMENT IN A SOCIAL ENVIRONMENT Considering the situation when a new restaurant is being set up or completely renovated in its brand identity and image, marketing studies or consultancies tend to target a defined number of cultural segments. Usually they try to define particular kinds of customers to attract at the beginning and keep for the future, although that is not always possible, especially in big cities, where customers are likely to have different cultural backgrounds and they have to share the space with other individuals belonging to other cultures. (P. Hunsaker and T. Alessandra, 2008) Therefore, restaurants’ managers should question if it is more important to make everyone feel comfortable by adapting to their own cultural norms, or to smooth out differences by designing space with a new common sense of freedom and respect towards other cultures. The answer depends on which kind of restaurant is considered. Location and type of food are two factors that could make the difference in the variety of potential customers to attract, together with food trends and space ambience. In most cases, the variety of customers is high and a mix of cultures is likely to occur. Designers and restaurateurs should both be aware that distance among tables is fundamental for customers to feel comfortable and adequately separated from strangers at other tables. (S.E. Kimes , G.M. Thompson, 2004) Thus, one complaint that guests often make on restaurants’ websites is their disappointment with tables that are too close to each other. In restaurant settings where individuals are often surrounded by parties of strangers, they prefer to sit at tables where they can have control over their personal space, either by having ample space to work with or by having a physical feature that separate them from nearby diners. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) S. K.A. Robson conducted in 2004 a studio which shows, by comparing satisfaction ratings for other components of the dining experience, that customers seated at tables that were tightly spaced generally expressed lower satisfaction in almost every category of the survey. Compared to those at the widely spaced tables, guests seated at tables near to each other were less happy with the food, the quality of the service, and the wisdom of choosing that restaurant – as a consequence of negative emotions due to proxemics issue. Clearly, the spacing between tables has a substantial effect on guest satisfaction. In that regard, guests seated close to other tables expressed a significantly lower likelihood of returning than those at well-spaced tables. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) FLEXIBLE LAYOUT AND EFFECTIVE VISUAL PROSPECTIVE Flexibility in tables layout and ‘freedom to choose’ where to sit are both solutions to be considered when dealing with a mix different kinds of customers, especially when the probability that the belong to different cultures is high. The word flexibility, in this context, indicates moveable furniture, such as chairs or tables. In a restaurant where customers can decide the distance among themselves and others, the issue of proxemics would be largely solved. Moreover, designing less busy areas can be a good solution for people who want a quiet environment while eating; conversely tables displayed closer to each other could suit other individuals that prefer a social atmosphere and who are not bothered by being close to strangers. Individuals tend to seek greater privacy than groups, and typically choose booth seating over counter seats whenever possible largely because booths provide much more personal space that is easily defended from encroachment by others (Underhill, 1999). Interior designers should, in almost every project, consider the idea of divide the space in different areas that have different purposes. For example one area could be more quiet and intimate, for couples or business dinners, and another could be suitable for large groups. When furniture’s flexibility is not possible for lack of space reason, designers should take into account customers’ visual perspective while seated, which is affected by the structure of the eye and the angle at which objects are

viewed (Baraban, S. Regina, J. F. Durocher, 1989). The more designers understand how vision zones work, the more effectively they can manipulate visual space. Guests, for example, are more affected by surrounding elements in a banquette and more private in a booth, where the field of vision is narrower. The latter limits visual stimulation and distractions, provides a feeling of intimacy, thus leading to slower turnover of tables, which works well for restaurants that are not quantity focused. Moreover, using angled tables rather than banquettes can eliminate the perception that another customer is in one’s personal space. In fact, freestanding angled tables can create a sense of intimacy and cut visual distraction throughout a dining room. (Baraban, S. Regina, J. F. Durocher, 1989)

SEATS CONFIGURATION AND COMMUNICATION AMONG PARTNERS After analysing distance among tables, a zoom on distance among people sitting at the same table is needed. As proxemics studies have proved, the needing of personal space is lower when individuals deal with people they know well. If we take into account a group of friends or, even a couple, they would probably be eager to share their personal space with their partners, for affect aims or simply to converse. Some seating configurations are more suitable to have conversations than others. Proxemics studies show that most people prefer to sit at right angles to their partners in conversation. (A. Mehrabian, S.G. Diamond, 1971) Despite that, only in slow times would couples be seated at a four top that would allow them to sit at an angle, because most restaurants offer parties of two and, most of them seat at the typical face-to-face setting. Proxemics studies suggest that this arrangement can be regarded as confrontational and, moreover, it’s hard for two people to have an intimate conversation with a table between them. Fine dining restaurants should recognize this and may offer side-by-side seating for parties of two, especially couples. This kind of seating is more efficient from a revenue management point of view than placing a couple at a table for four, but is likely to be viewed as too intimate for business dining. Therefore, it is important for designers to think of the possibility that customers may be in various types of relationships and need to be able to regulate their personal space, especially if it is likely for the restaurant to attract business professionals. Even with respect to distance between people sitting at the same table, flexibility should be factored in if possible. When customers have the chance to regulate their own personal space, their general satisfaction with the dining experience is proved to be higher. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) AFFECT-CREATION THROUGH ATMOSPHERE In marketing, the term ‘atmospherics’ has been used by Kotler since 1973 to describe the conscious designing of space to create certain effects in customers and, more specifically, the effort to design buying environments to produce specific emotional effects in the customer that enhance his purchase probability. Atmosphere, in fact, serves as an affect-creating tool and should always been used by designers when designing a restaurant. The colours, the sounds and textures of the space may directly arouse visceral reactions that contribute positively to purchase probability. (L.A. Gutnik, 2006) Atmosphere is felt through the senses, therefore all sensorial stimulus must be in harmony and accurately designed to create an elegant and balanced environment. The latter is the outer frame of the meal, representing the room, the interactions with other customers, all the other sounds from the kitchen or the outside, which together create an overall impression of the restaurant. As a part of the outer frame, culture and the social context, together with location where the restaurant is set, should be considered as atmosphere elements. In some cases, atmosphere can be used as an “evocative” tool. Through design choices, it can evoke some particular trend, mood, culture, without totally belonging to them. This technique could be useful for new restaurants that need to gain some notoriety on the market. (F. Morace, 2011) In any case, from a designer’s point of view, harmony of all the elements of a restaurant’s atmosphere can be achieved starting from the values of the company that owns the business. This is directly related to brand identity and customers’ perception of the entire organization. Atmosphere, together with quality of food and service, is the most important channel for the restaurateur to instil their brand’s values and strengths. (H.Han, K. Ryu, 2009) The mission of the business can be shown through dozens of design elements, including lights (warm, cold, bright, suffused, spotlight, ambient light), colours palettes (tones, saturation, contrasts, warm, cold), materials (warm, cold, soft, rough, light, heavy, natural, artificial), readable elements (menu, logo, signs, business cards), furniture, table settings, decorations and the entrance. Since it takes seven seconds for an impression to be installed in an individual’s brain (A. Pitts, 2013), the latter is probably one of the most important elements. The entrance should communicate the values of the restaurant and should be used as an “introduction” to the experience the customer has just started. To summarize, atmosphere can be identified as a feeling of “being at home”, along with service encounters that should contribute to a relaxed and comfortable environment. The atmosphere or the perception of the entirety of

the meal is a product of both material and immaterial factors and the role of designers is to guarantee the balance between the two.

CONCLUSIONS This research highlights the deep connection between personal space, customers’ impressions and emotions, and foodservice experience; elements that are crucially influenced by people’s cultural background. Designers should build in this knowledge in order to create restaurant settings that support desired proxemics behaviour of a wide cultural target and, in general, of a wide variety of custumers. Undoubtedly, designing dining areas that reduce the feeling of crowding through table spacing may encourage customers to stay longer and may even affect spending behaviour and therefore revenue potential in the dining area. (S.K.A. Robson, 2004) Alongside, flexible well thought out designs could be one of the most effective solutions to deal with the complexity of a wide target audience, to raise the possibility to be able to satisfy every customer. Together with space issues, quality of experience and atmosphere should be considered as strategic tools to show a restaurant’s strengths, to distinguish it from other competitors. Both restaurateurs and designers should always be aware of their target’s needing and follow the principles of user-centered design and experience design, since the values at the base of hospitality services are comfort, experience and kindness towards each guest.

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