‘It impacts everybody’: How retailers & store designers are battling sensory overload
In 2022, a car accident left Meg Lefeld with a traumatic brain injury and post-concussion syndrome. Lefeld, the director of business development for Ohio-based visual merchandising agency ZenGenius, wasn’t able to work for months and had to go through a series of treatments and intensive therapies.
When approved to go back to work for just a couple hours a day, she had a hard time working in certain environments due to the brain injury. Her focus on retailers and events that she previously found exciting brought her to places she found overwhelming. At times, “I had to leave right away because I couldn’t handle the lights or the music or all the external stimulation,” Lefeld said. “It weighed on me really heavily, and for a while, I was just not happy with work.”
Lefeld’s experience inspired her to better understand how to address overstimulation in retail spaces, taking people who are neurodivergent or have post-traumatic stress disorders into consideration. Sensory processing disabilities can be common among people with ADHD, dyslexia, post-traumatic stress disorder and autism, among other conditions.
She said the injury changed her perspective and made her more cognizant of the many sensations people may experience inside a store. “When I go into a space, I’m aware of what’s happening with the type of music that’s playing, or if the lights aren’t aimed properly on the product or the volume of the music.”
At industry events, Lefeld has been encouraging retailers to implement solutions. These include designated spaces for customers to take a sensory break, limits on loud noises in stores, scent-free zones in stores, simplifying store layouts and adding light or sound controls to areas like fitting rooms to suit customers’ needs.
Over the past few years, some retailers have taken steps to address sensory overload. In April, nonprofit KultureCity certified all of Lego’s stores in the U.S. and Canada as sensory-inclusive, providing staff training and access to support tools. Lego stores started offering sensory bags at checkout at no cost with headphones, fidget tools, visual cue cards and strobe-reduction glasses. Walmart continues to offer sensory-friendly hours every morning in its U.S. stores, which it first offered in 2023 alongside other retailers. During these periods, the store’s radio is turned off, the TVs are set to still images and the lights are dimmed where possible.
As more retailers rethink their spaces to help with sensory overload, Lefeld and other retail professionals still see a void to be filled for stores centered around these concepts.
Lefeld is working to raise awareness about this issue alongside other retail professionals. She spoke at an industry event in Columbus, Ohio, in October on accessible and inclusive store design. Faith Huddleston, a retail design director for design and architecture firm Nelson Worldwide, spoke with her on a panel. In a conversation with Modern Retail, Lefeld and Huddleston pointed to some of the issues they often see in stores that can be distracting or overwhelming to some: Lights may be too bright, music may be too loud. Aisles may be cluttered, disorganized or too tight. Even certain colors or smells can trigger different emotions, Huddleston added.
Failure to account for neurodiversity could lead to legal action. One example came in 2022 when a Subway franchisee in Arizona agreed to pay $30,000 to resolve allegations that it did not provide requested accommodations to a new employee with autism in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
“Neurodiversity is going to come at us in a bigger way, and if we don’t pay attention to it, if we don’t do it, there are going to be more lawsuits,” Huddleston said. “I think this next generation coming up, they care more about issues like this; they’re going to influence the next round of retail design. I think we’ll see more and more of it.”
Huddleston said her work over the last five years has focused especially on creating immersive, experiential branded activations for retailers meant to excite people, often through lights and music. But after talking with people like Lefeld, she found it was not often discussed how these features may overwhelm shoppers, especially neurodivergent people. “We’re becoming immune to digital screens; we’re becoming immune to some of the saturated, adrenaline-pumping experiences,” Huddleston said. “I want to see more pushback in some of these areas. … It has to be very thoughtful before you just do it.”
Huddleston said dimmable lights are now crucial so retailers can adjust to brighter times of day or hold sensory-friendly hours with darker lights and softer music. Using timed diffusers and avoiding synthetic scents could help to ease strong smells, she added. “We shouldn’t just try to squeak by with the minimum standards. We should really do the right thing and consider all people from the get-go because it’s about dignity.”
So far, aside from the Lego Store and sensory-friendly hours at the grocers, there are few examples of retailers implementing these recommendations on a large scale. Lefeld credits Anthropologie with having a welcoming store design and nice materials but admits such a store tailored around curbing sensory overload is still yet to be seen. Part of the problem, Lefeld said, is that retailers might not have readily available information on the right vendors and products to add to their stores.
Lefeld also recommends incorporating neurodivergent people into the design process when tackling these issues. “You can’t really understand what it’s like unless you personally experience it,” she said.
It goes beyond helping neurodivergent people. Lefeld argues making changes like buying the right kinds of lights, being thoughtful with music and understanding exactly how spaces influence guests are well worth the investment for retailers.
“Yes, there’s a community of people that are more sensitive and physically can’t go into these spaces, but regardless, it impacts everybody, even if individuals haven’t realized it.”