Energy Saving and Tourism Sustainability: Solar Control Window Film in Hotel Rooms

This paper investigates solar control film as an energy saver in the fast growing hotel sector in southern China. It investigates claims made for this low-cost retrofitted material in hotel rooms, calibrating reductions in solar gain in summer. It provides reliable and independent data about the performance and economic viability of solar control film in real hotel environments. The study found that, by limiting solar gain, the film helps limit tourism's impact on global warming and climate change. The paper also foreshadows new technical glazing developments.     

Ruin Problems for Phase-Type(2) Risk Processes

In this paper we consider a risk process in which claim inter-arrival times have a phase-type(2) distribution, a distribution with a density satisfying a second order linear differential equation. We consider some ruin related problems. In particular, we consider the compound geometric representation of the infinite time survival probability, as well as the (defective) distributions of the surplus immediately prior to ruin and of the deficit at ruin. We also consider explicit solutions for the infinite time ruin probability in the case where the individual claim amount distribution is phase-type.     

“My Fifty Shoes Are All Different!” Exploring,Defining, and Characterizing Acquisitive Buying

Why does someone buy the tenth pair of black shoes or the fourteenth white t‐shirt? Typically, extreme buying is associated with negative feelings and consequences: issues of self‐control, guilt, and financial problems are common among compulsive, impulsive, excessive buying, fixated buying, and hoarding. However, through two studies, the authors describe “acquisitive buyers,” who exhibit an extreme yet controlled acquisition process for items in a chosen product category. In his/her mind, these items are minutely differentiated and enrich the inventory, and there is logical justification that every purchase enhances his/her preparedness for anticipated specific product use occasions. Materialism, positive perfectionism and variety‐seeking in a particular product category are some of the characteristics of these buyers. The studies also help distinguish acquisitive buying from other types of extreme buying and mainstream buying.     

Revisiting Tversky's Trail—How Money Makes a Subtle Difference in Similarity Effect Experiments

Recent findings in research on context effects indicate that, as opposed to choices under hypothetical settings, compromise effects are significantly attenuated in binding settings that include real payments for products. The present investigation examines to what extent this finding applies to yet another context effect, namely the similarity effect (SE). The SE stipulates that, compared with initial shares of two options A and B in a binary choice set, the introduction of an option C that is dissimilar to B but similar to A will hurt the latter more than the nonadjacent option B. The conducted online survey examines the SE in unforced choices of experienced consumers between real brands across three consumer good categories. The results confirm that the SE is evidently reduced under real payment conditions, hence confirming the hypothesis that the applied choice setting moderates the efficacy of the composition of choice sets.     

An empirical analysis of green supply chain management in the German automotive industry

The purpose of this paper is the empirical investigation of the status quo of green supply chain management in the German automotive industry from a practitioner's point of view. Several aspects of green supply chain management, such as the point of time of implementation, the driving forces, the relevance of intended goals and their particular realization and the adoption of eco‐programs with suppliers and customers as well as internal and external barriers are analyzed. Furthermore, the link to different performance criteria is tested by inductive statistics in order to show the potential of green supply chain management for competitiveness. For this study, managers from the automotive supply industry in Germany were asked about their estimations in this regard. The main conclusion is that managers express the need for green supply chain management on the one hand but also see corresponding problems in terms of required resources on the other hand. Furthermore, the analyses show that green supply chain management leads to higher performance in terms of several performance criteria. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Projective customer competence: Projecting future customer needs that drive innovation performance

Projective customer competence is the ability of a product development organization to both understand as well as shape the future needs of customers. To conceptualize this competence and establish its antecedents and performance implications, we draw upon the literature on inter-organizational relationships and innovation. Based on survey data from managers involved with business to business product development, validated with secondary financial data and in-depth interviews, we establish measurement properties for projective customer competence and demonstrate that this competence develops through customer relationships characterized by relational embeddedness, knowledge redundancy and interactivity. Projective customer competence is also shown to have positive implications for both innovativeness and financial performance. Surprisingly, relational embeddedness is shown to be the strongest predictor of projective customer competence, and, while knowledge redundancy helps build projective customer competence, it also has a negative impact on innovativeness.     

A dual‐sequence framework for B2C relationship formation: Moderating effects of employee communication style in online group chat

Past research on B2C relationships has typically focused on unidimensional constructs of satisfaction, trust, and commitment, ignoring underlying psychological dimensions. Although some studies have examined cognitive and affective dimensions of these relational constructs, dual sequential effects in relationship formation have not been investigated. This study proposes and finds (in the context of online group chat) that parallel cognitive and affective sequences of relationship formation take place, thus expanding scholarly understanding of underlying psychological processes and offering marketing practitioners two different ways to build relationships with consumers. The proposed dual‐sequence relational framework further advances theory by shedding light on counterintuitive findings in past research. The study also supports the proposed moderating effects of employee communication style, such that sequential effects of cognitive (affective) relational constructs are stronger with a task‐oriented (socially oriented) employee, thus offering insights to practitioners in hiring and training employees to match specific organizational goals for building relationships with consumers. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Integrating nanotechnology into agri-food systems research in India: A conceptual framework

The implications of current trends in nanotechnology for the agri-food sector in India are assessed. Using published literature and patents data, a model to organize the information is developed through a specially designed database. The database allows mapping research themes in nanotechnology to specific sectors in the agricultural value chain to enable a rational assessment of the potential applications of nanotechnology in the agri-food sector, identifying and prioritizing research needs across the agricultural value chain, and assessing the environmental and societal implications of this emerging technology.