Service Scape

Introduction

Service setting plays a critical role in shaping expectations, differentiating service firms, facilitating customer and employee customer goals, and influencing the nature of customer experiences (Bitner, 1992). The servicescape is the outward appearance of the organization and thus can be critical in forming initial impression or setting up customer expectations (Anand, 2008).Consumers seek evidence of the eventual ‘quality’ of the intangible service from observing the tangible elements – that is, the servicescape (Berry & Parasuraman,1991 ). Bitner (1992) identifies three primary dimensions of the servicescape that influence customers’ holistic perceptions of the servicescape (i.e. perceived quality) and their subsequent internal (i.e. satisfaction with servicescape) and external responses (i.e. approach/avoidance, staying, the repatronage).The three dimensions are: Ambient conditions; Spatial layout and functionality; Signs, symbols and artifacts.

Physical Dimensions

Ambient Condition

Ambient conditions include background characteristics of the environment such as temperature, lighting, noise, music, and scent. As a general rule, ambient conditions affect the five senses. However, sometimes such dimensions may be totally imperceptible

Music

Environmental psychologists have claimed that individuals react to organisational environments by exhibiting approach or avoid behaviour (Mehrabian and Russell, 1974). Various studies have stressed the importance of the congruity concept within service environments. For example, Mattila and Wirtz (2006) reported how pleasure and satisfaction derived from the service experience might depend on congruity between consumers’ target-arousal levels and the actual service environment arousal levels. The importance of musical congruity as a crucial component in many service environment studies is consistent with a literature review by Oakes (2007) highlighting the importance of congruity in studies examining the...