A Social Service Robot in a Shopping Mall

Abstract

Consumers often respond positively to social service robots in retail context but less is known about the expectations and success criteria of the management and retailers for such robots. We have introduced a humanoid social robot (Pepper) in a shopping mall and report the results of a mall management workshop, interviews of eight retailers and a consumer customer workshop. The results show that the stakeholders find important that the robot creates warm and fun atmosphere in the mall as well as provides practical help for the customers and workers.