Author

Paco Underhill

Global. Funny. Visionary. And more. Paco is the son of an American Diplomat. He grew up in Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe, before returning to the U.S. for high school. He attended Columbia University and Ehwa University, in Seoul, Korea before getting his undergraduate degree from Vassar College. He has spent the past 40 years as an inventor of tools to understand human behavior and predict the future.

Here’s even more. Founder and former CEO of Envirosell Inc. for 34 years a Behavioral Research and Consulting firm based in New York City with global offices. Paco’s expertise is in the meeting point of the physical and digital worlds, including stores, banks, airports, libraries, museums, shopping malls, offices, cruise ships, model homes, and websites.  His  work has been profiled in The New Yorker Magazine, Smithsonian Magazine, and others.

Paco is author of multiple global bestselling books – including Why We Buy:  The Science of Shopping published in 27 languages and used in design schools and MBA programs all over the world.  Other books include Call of the Mall, What Women Want, and How We Eat – The Brave New World of Food and Drink.

It’s Fiesta!

Fort Worth is Texas’s best-kept secret. In the shadow of Dallas, its more prominent neighbor, it sits quietly with an elegant downtown containing good retail, ...
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Shopping + Culture

When the Museum of Modern Art opened its new building in 2004, admission was priced at $20. And the cultural world gasped. Behind closed doors, ...
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Cash

The 21st-century economist understands cash on a global market scale. Trillions are sitting in accounts across the world. The largest global technology companies are sitting ...
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Mall in Manhattan

Westfield World Trade Center had its soft opening last week; it’s the latest masterpiece of rebirth of lower Manhattan since the 9/11 tragedy. It has ...
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A Korean Story

Why should any of us in the world of retail pay any attention to the 38th parallel that divides the Korean Peninsula? In an unforgiving ...
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Applied Theory on Brazil: Notes From the Tropics

Art, theater, and retail have all been intertwined in American culture going back nearly two centuries, to Godey’s Lady Book in 1830. As recently as ...
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A Socio-Anthro Take on the State of Shopping

My favorite 14-year-old girl, like so many in her generation, is lost without her phone. In spite of school, sports, eating and sleeping, she spends ...
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A Parking Lot Story

Joni Mitchell wrote the line “They paved Paradise and put up a parking lot.” How much of our lives are defined by parking. Call it ...
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