Babies in the Workplace

changing table in the bathroom can be a big source of frustration to parents and can be a deterrent to coming to a business. A business that allows its employees to bring in babies is clearly showing customers that it cares about their needs as parents as well. As a practical matter, it can even make it easier for parents to take their young children shopping if they know there will be babies at the store, because many children find babies fascinating and enjoy interacting with them as much or more than some adults do.

Specialty stores, such as local bookstores, can utilize a baby program to help buffer them from the ever-growing threat presented by the internet and large chain stores. To compete with the internet and encourage people to leave their houses to go shopping, some businesses are creating shopping "experiences." People patronize these businesses because they enjoy the ambiance (for example,

Starbucks), the novelty (Build-A-Bear stores for kids), or the range of things available for them to do (Apple Stores). Implementing a baby program can turn a store into an "experience" for customers, and it actually fulfills all three of these customer desires. Sleeping or babbling babies transform the ambiance of a business, they have a substantial novelty factor, and they give customers something to do (play with or talk to the baby) while they are shopping.

   Willie Jones, the owner of Magical Journey Bookstore, said that:

   Customers thought it was the coolest thing
   they ever saw. They thought it was great to
   have someone ringing up a sale with a baby
   in a sling on her hip, or a baby laying on the
   hearth asleep in a bassinet.