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Together or alone: Should service robots and frontline employees collaborate in retail-customer interactions at the POS?

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  • De Gauquier, Laurens
  • Willems, Kim
  • Cao, Hoang-Long
  • Vanderborght, Bram
  • Brengman, Malaika

Abstract

This study investigates shopper behavior when interacting with an employee-robot team (vs. both actors in isolation), along the metrics of the POS conversion funnel. An unobtrusive field study was conducted using video observations, evenly spread over four conditions: (1) a control condition (i.e., no stimulus), (2) a frontline employee, (3) a humanoid service robot, and (4) an employee-robot team. The results indicate that the service robot was the better option to generate attention and stop passers-by, but in this condition the least amount of passers-by were lured into the store. While the frontline employee initiated the lowest amount of interactions, he could convert the highest number of passersby into actual buyers. The robot-employee team managed to encourage the highest number of passers-by to look at the store, but did not convert more of them into actual buyers than the robot on its own.

Suggested Citation

  • De Gauquier, Laurens & Willems, Kim & Cao, Hoang-Long & Vanderborght, Bram & Brengman, Malaika, 2023. "Together or alone: Should service robots and frontline employees collaborate in retail-customer interactions at the POS?," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joreco:v:70:y:2023:i:c:s0969698922002697
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jretconser.2022.103176
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Brengman, Malaika & De Gauquier, Laurens & Willems, Kim & Vanderborght, Bram, 2021. "From stopping to shopping: An observational study comparing a humanoid service robot with a tablet service kiosk to attract and convert shoppers," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 263-274.
    2. Oh, Hyunjoo & Petrie, Jenny, 2012. "How do storefront window displays influence entering decisions of clothing stores?," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 27-35.
    3. Sang M. Lee & DonHee Lee, 2020. "“Untact”: a new customer service strategy in the digital age," Service Business, Springer;Pan-Pacific Business Association, vol. 14(1), pages 1-22, March.
    4. Stephan Seiler & Fabio Pinna, 2017. "Estimating Search Benefits from Path-Tracking Data: Measurement and Determinants," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 36(4), pages 565-589, July.
    5. Larivière, Bart & Bowen, David & Andreassen, Tor W. & Kunz, Werner & Sirianni, Nancy J. & Voss, Chris & Wünderlich, Nancy V. & De Keyser, Arne, 2017. "“Service Encounter 2.0”: An investigation into the roles of technology, employees and customers," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 238-246.
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    Cited by:

    1. Khaksar, Seyed Mohammad Sadegh & Shahmehr, Fatemeh S. & Miah, Shah & Daim, Tugrul & Ozdemir, Dilek, 2024. "Privacy concerns versus personalisation benefits in social robot acceptance by employees: A paradox theory — Contingency perspective," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    2. de Kervenoael, Ronan & Schwob, Alexandre & Hasan, Rajibul & Psylla, Evangelia, 2024. "SIoT robots and consumer experiences in retail: Unpacking repeat purchase intention drivers leveraging computers are social actors (CASA) paradigm," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).

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