Service Management 7th Edition by James Fitzsimmons, Mona Fitzsimmons

Exercise 4

A convenience store is considering changing its layout to encourage impulse buying. The triangular flow matrix below gives the measure of association between different product groups (e.g., beer, milk, magazines). A plus sign ( _ ) indicates a high association, such as between beer and peanuts; a minus sign (?) indicates a repulsion, such as between beer and milk; and a zero (0) indicates no association.

Using the initial layout below, perform an operations sequence analysis to determine a layout that will encourage impulse buying by placing high-association product groups close to one another.