Impact of Visual Merchandising on Impulse Buying Behavior in Clothing Stores: Evidence from the Western Province of Sri Lanka

Abstract

Today the competition and problems in the retail sector have increased. Therefore, every retailer implements various strategies to increase sales and differentiate products from their rivals. Retailers use Visual merchandising as a strategy to attract more customers to increase sales. Visual merchandising is essential to trigger the inner feelings of consumers while encouraging customers to make impulsive purchases. More impulsive purchases help retailers to increase sales and maximize profit. The purpose of the study was to investigate the impact of selected visual merchandising tools on impulse buying behavior in clothing stores. This study mainly focuses on four important tools of visual merchandising and the hypothesis is based on these i.e., window display, color and lighting, corporate identity, and space and layout. The conceptual framework of the current study is developed based on a deep review of past literature. Data was collected from 390 respondents in the Western province under simple random sampling. And the collected data was evaluated through descriptive statistics, correlation, and multiple linear regression by using SPSS. And the results of the study validated that selected visual merchandising tools have an impact on the impulse buying behavior of consumers in clothing stores. This study will help offline retailers and marketers to create stores attractively and to overcome the challenges of online fashion retailers.