Lighting preferences of female shoppers on women's specialty retail store merchandise displays

Accent lighting is used to add visual impact to displays and compel the customers' attention. Large amounts of money are invested in retail lighting systems every year, making it imperative that retailers are sure their lighting costs produce a return on investment. The purpose of this research was to investigate what type of lighting enables merchandise from a women's specialty retail store to look most appealing to its customers. The experimental design used in this study is a one-shot design in which three forms of lighting are manipulated. The experiment took place in the Human Sciences building at Texas Tech University. The sample was drawn from the female faculty and staff (N=2061) within the Texas Tech University main campus system, and was composed of those with a minimum age of 21. The sample was asked to view three merchandise displays which were exactly alike except for the lighting being used. Participants were asked to complete a questionnaire after viewing the displays. Analysis was performed using the MANOVA test. Results showed that overall, participants preferred the metal halide and the tungsten halogen lamps over the fluorescent lamp.