9th Student Research Conference in Marketing (SRCM) - 2025
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Item The Impact of Visual Merchandising Strategies on Impulsive Buying Behaviour in Fashion Retail Stores in Sri Lanka: The Mediating role of Customer Emotions, among the Youth Generation(Department of Marketing Management, Faculty of Commerce and Management Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka., 2025) Madhuwanthi, K. P. P. S.; Wanninayake, W. M. C. B.; Ekanayake, G. D.As the fashion retail industry is highly competitive and growing rapidly. So, retailers are using visual merchandising strategies to differentiate their offerings from others and enhance product satisfaction. The present study mainly aspires to explore how visual merchandising strategies affect impulsive buying behaviour together with the mediating effect of customer emotions among the youth generation, with an emphasis on the fashion retail industry in Sri Lanka. Based on these facts, the study has pointed out six visual merchandising strategies such as window display, mannequin display, promotional signage, floor merchandising, lighting arrangement, and colour combination to study its effect on impulsive purchase behaviour. And also, present research talks about positive customer emotions such as pleasure (happiness, joy), arousal (energy, excitement), dominance (freedom). The present study uses quantitative research approach. So, primary data was collected from 385 valid respondents who have visited the fashion retail stores in Sri Lanka, during the last six months of year 2024. The data collected through structured questionnaire. The findings showed that customer emotions act as a mediator in the relationship between the visual merchandising strategies and impulsive buying behaviour. Convenience sampling method used for making the sampling framework of the study and quantitative research approach has been used in this study. Data analysis was done by descriptive, correlation analysis, simple regression, and multiple regression analysis using IBM SPSS Statistics 25. The result of this present study gives evidence that four dimensions of Visual Merchandising Strategies Mannequin Display, Promotional Signage, Lighting Arrangement, and Floor Merchandising significantly influence Impulsive Buying Behaviour. Within these four strategies, mannequin display, promotional signage and lighting arrangement have a positive significant relationship whereas floor merchandising has a negative impact upon impulsive buying behaviour. Again, the other two dimensions are Window Display as well as Colour Combination, which have not significantly affected impulsive buying behaviour. However overall, the relation of visual merchandising strategies appears to be significantly positive in its positive influence upon impulsive buying behaviour and customer emotions. Furthermore, Customer Emotions mediates the relationship between Visual Merchandising Strategies and Impulsive Buying Behaviour. Therefore, this research contributes to newness in knowledge by elaborating that the influence of visual merchandising strategies on impulsive buying behaviour is strengthened by the mediating role of customer emotions. Despite these useful insights, the study has some of limitations. The geographical distribution of the sample is biased, with 50% of the responses coming from the Western and Northwestern provinces. This could affect the generalization of the findings to the whole country since consumer behaviour in those less-representative provinces may be very different. Also, the use of self-administered online questionnaires opens up the opportunity for response bias in that participants might misinterpret some questions or answer less truthfully without guidance. Again, the exclusion of qualitative methods such as interviews or focus groups restricts the possibility of deep exploration into the motivations and emotions of respondents. The study’s findings provide actionable recommendations for retailers, both large and small, to improve their store environments. Retailers should prioritize impactful strategies such as mannequin displays, promotional signage, and effective lighting arrangement to evoke positive emotions and drive impulsive buying behaviour. Visual merchandising strategies that resonate with the preferences and emotions of the younger demographic will help drive consumer engagement and increase market share by providing value to consumers. The study will also help consumers understand marketing strategies and how they should behave during shopping. Furthermore, policymakers can make better decisions by optimizing their knowledge of the fashion retail industry and consumer behaviour.Item The Impact of Visual Merchandising on Gen Z's Impulsive Buying Behaviour on E-commerce Platforms in The Western Province of Sri Lanka(Department of Marketing Management, Faculty of Commerce and Management Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka., 2025) Riptha, M. P. A. F.; Wanninayake, W. M. C. B.; Ekanayake, G. D.This research primarily attempts to try concerning the difference that visual merchandising creates on an impulsive buying behaviour as well as established such behaviour by consumers but particularly Generation Z (Gen Z) who are into online buying going across an e-commerce platform in the Western Province of Sri Lanka. The emergence of online shopping demanded that one understands the various consumer behaviour phenomena on impulsive buying. Particularly investigated were how such display strategies were applied in triggering impulsive buying by product displays, websites, colour schemes, and promotional visuals. The study is to fill the gap in the existing literature regarding how visual elements help to shape Gen Z's purchasing decisions while offering a window into the Sri Lankan e-commerce market. The fundamental argument proposition is that well-structured, visually stimulating websites can convince impulsive purchases very well, all channelling personal to time-limited promotional elements. This study employs a quantitative method through a structured questionnaire survey of 384 respondents. Convenience sampling is used to select respondents who frequently interact with e-commerce from the western province of Sri Lanka. This research survey was organized to find the effects of some visual merchandising techniques on impulsive buying behaviour. The setting of this research is in a country that is currently advancing into an online market: becoming popular within the young, tech-savvy audience in Sri Lanka. Descriptive and inferential statistical techniques were utilized in analysing the data to come up with meaningful insights with respect to the relationships posited between visual merchandising factors and consumer behaviour. This research indicates that an appealing web-design, flashy display of products, and colourful promotional graphics trigger impulsive buyer behaviour among consumers of Generation Z. Another effect was that personalizing visuals by formulating them according to individuals' preferences drew remarkably high impulse buying. Time-limited sales such as flash sales and countdown timers have also been confirmed to be the most prominent key contributors to impulse purchases. These results agree with prior studies that underline the stimulation of such consumer behaviour by visuals. However, in the modern mobile world, a well-optimized visual merchandising strategy becomes necessary because the majority of respondents use smartphones to access e-commerce. The integration of social media with e-commerce platforms also represents an effective way to entice spontaneous purchases through instant interactive content delivery. A few limitations attached to the present study exist, even though the study contributes immensely. The restrictions on generalizability might be processed because of convenient sampling, making the participants in the sample not very representative of the whole population of e-commerce consumers in Sri Lanka. Secondly, the inclusion of online surveys restricts the depiction of consumer decision-making in context because it appears that the data is not collected, mostly acquired from the participants via survey questions. Generally speaking, data collection is cross-sectional; thus, these cannot be expressions of cause-outcomes between visual merchandising strategies and impulsive buying behaviour. The consideration for future research might be seen factoring these two variables by longitudinal designs or engaging qualitative methods of research like interviews or focus groups for deeper insights into consumer motivations. Theoretical implications of this study with respect to consumer behaviour in the era of e-commerce mainly centre on how Generation Z responds to visual merchandising. Extending the studies of impulsive buying, the study identifies and analyses the key role of visual components in defining online shopping experiences. Based on results obtained, this study has some practical implications for e-commerce businesses in Sri Lanka. To better optimize visual merchandising strategies and to convincingly prompt consumption, the design of websites should focus on having visually attractive and mobile-optimized websites, use personalized product displays, and launch time-sensitive promotions that aim to grab consumers' attention. These can also be supplemented by getting social media involved with the experience of shopping online along with putting in interactivity aspects for better engagement and bigger impulses to purchase. Future studies can even explore the effectiveness of new technology such as augmented reality (AR) or virtual reality (VR) toward the improvement of efforts in visual merchandising and the effects of ethical consumerism and sustainability on Gen Z's decision-making processes.