With over 30 years of experience, REAL Insight has led projects across a variety of industries that successfully identified consumer behavior and expectations, helping CPG companies, retailers, and other clients understand how consumers act in a variety of contexts.
One of the biggest myths about qualitative data is that it isn't actionable. That it needs to be used in conjunction with quant to uncover the real story. But just like quant, its ability to be actionable is completely linked with its level of data quality. In the case of qualitative research, QUALITY comes from…
Working on redesigns is one of our specialties at REAL Insight. Our in-context solutions and shopper expertise allow our clients to navigate the risks and create optimal packaging. The biggest risk to a redesign is subconscious alienation. This happens after a redesign when a shopper enters a category they shop in every week, scans the…
What if there was a way to collect behavioral data at the speed of shopping? Renown psychologist Daniel Kahneman identified that our brain is split into System 1 (S1) and System 2 (S2) thinking. We spend 95% of the time using System 1 which consists of our automatic, intuitive, instinctive, and impulsive thinking. Reacting to…
People only read about 10 words on a shopping trip. Why is this?Words are the last thing we use to locate and evaluate products. We shop using shape, color, and key visuals first because these can be processed by our unconscious mind. Words have the least influence in shopping because they are the only element…
The first entries in this series focus on Shape and Color as the first two elements of the Navigational Hierarchy. This third installment highlights the next element, Key Visuals, and how shoppers utilize them at-shelf. A Key Visual is a focal point of a package design that is intended to drive interest, understanding, and at…
Our first entry on the Navigational Hierarchy talked about product and packaging Shape and how shoppers use it to identify categories and individual brands. Following Shape, Color is a powerful element that can cue brands or a category. Capable of triggering persuasive subconscious reactions in shoppers, it is the most emotive of the visual cues.…
Store environments are overwhelmingly stimulating for the human brain. In order to manage the thousands of products available for purchase, the brain employs what we call the Navigational Hierarchy—a filtering sequence to narrow the search for the sought-after product. Our brain unconsciously cycles through the elements that distinguish products from each other, beginning broadly with…
The challenge of creating sustainable products and packaging is nuanced and requires an understanding of how people shop and consume your products. First, the product needs to succeed at-shelf and be purchased, then it needs to be recycled, reused, composted, or disposed of properly. The risk of friction or deselection when renovating to a greener…
Prior to the pandemic, we were spoiled by in-store design research that gave us the depth to understand the “whys and hows” and deliver actionable consumer insights to our clients. We know the value and authenticity that being in-store provides, so when the pandemic hit and we needed to innovate, we had very high standards…
Holidays are a unique time for shoppers. Habits change for a short time, and consumers tend to feel more empowered to make less socially permissible purchases or to splurge on things they normally would not consider purchasing. Be it Halloween, Valentine's Day, Hanukkah, Christmas, or Fourth of July, expectations change around the major holidays of the year.…