News

Home center to track shopper movement, analyze behavior

October 22, 2008

HELSINKI — Rautakesko Ltd., the fifth biggest do-it-yourself retailer in Europe, has selected Ekahau's Wi-Fi-based real-time location solution (RTLS) for retail store customer behavior analysis.

Rautakesko will be using the RTLS technology from Ekahau to capture data on customers' shopping patterns. Customers at Rautakesko stores will have a special tag associated with them when they are shopping, enabling the system to identify their location and time spent within the store.

"The analysis of visitor behavior, including their walking routes, stopping patterns and wait times, produces invaluable knowledge about consumer habits and motivation," said Konsta Kuokkanen, project manager at Rautakesko. "This information helps us to arrange the store layout optimally and develop retail concepts." The system has been used to collect customer traffic data at Rautakesko's Byggmakker Trondheim in Norway and at K-rauta Orebro in Sweden.

Unlike competing solutions that are based on a proprietary infrared (IR), ultrawide band (UWB) wireless infrastructure, or use wall-mount video cameras, Ekahau RTLS utilizes the store's existing Wi-Fi network, eliminating the need to deploy new expensive infrastructure.