During my observation period, I noticed that the majority of the people coming into Panera Bread were white college students in their early to mid twenties. There were a few people that appeared to be older than twenty that also came in to Panera. Of the people that passed through the door, 52 were females and 28 were males. Out of the 52 females that entered the door, 20 of the females or 38.46% ordered at the fast lane kiosks and 24 or 46.15% of females waited in line to order their food in person. The other 5 or 9.62% of the females ordered ahead of time before they got to Panera Bread. For the males that entered into the cafe-bakery, 15 out of the 28 males or 53.57% ordered their food in person at the cash register and 10 or 35.71% of the males ordered their food at the fast lane kiosks. The other 3 males or 10.71% ordered online before they got to the cafe.
Age did not really make a difference in whether or not people would order at the fast lane kiosks because a majority of the people I observed were around the same age. The majority of the time when people decided to order at the fast lane kiosks, there were 2 or more people in line. However, there were a few instances when there was no one in line and people decide to order at the kiosks instead. When observing the people the ordered ahead of time online, the majority of them had large …show more content…
Impression management happens when a person makes an effort to control or influence the perception of other people. It seemed that the individuals who ordered at the fast lane kiosks were trying to not make themselves look indecisive. This is because the majority of the time when someone ordered at the kiosks they took longer to order than the people that were waiting in line to order in person. Some of these people could have ordered at the kiosks because they did not know what they wanted to order. So, with ordering at the fast lane kiosks people then did not have to wait on them to decide what they wanted and think that the individual was indecisive. When ordering at the fast lane kiosks the whole menu is presented in front of the customer so they can then decide what they want to order by what looks good to them. Some could have also ordered at the kiosks because they simply did not want to have to wait in line behind other people. However, ordering at the fast lane kiosks did not guarantee that the person would order or get their food faster than someone that ordered in person.
I also saw an example of a social norm during my observation at Panera Bread. A social norms are informal understandings that govern the behavior of members of a society. The example of a social norm at Panera was when the individuals ordered online if they had a larger than normal