Genetically Modified Foods

ABSTRACT

This study outlines the controversy surrounding genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and how it impacts North American based food service companies' marketing policies. Recent developments have made foods derived from GMOs a strategic marketing challenge for food service franchise and chain operations. Headlines such as “Why McDonalds Pulled Frankenfries from Menus” have unwittingly put restaurants on the frontline of the battle over foods made from GMOs (Martin, 2000). A survey method was used to explore food service operations' views regarding consumer acceptance of GMOs, right to know issues (labeling) and the benefits of GMOs, as well as food service companies' strategic response to this emerging technology. Findings indicate that food service establishments were generally concerned about customer opinions and tend to prefer government mandated labeling of GMOs. They also tend to feel that GMOs offer potential benefits to their industry and that customer concerns may fade over time.     

Estimating Consumer Preferences for Value-Added Fish Products in Oman

Abstract

The European meat industry is confronted with substantial changes of consumer preferences in relation to the type and quantity of meat in everyday diet. One of the main reasons behind these changes is the public impression that meat is a “dangerous” to consume food. This feeling is the result of recent food scares where meat played a central role and their effect on consumers' perceptions about meat safety. The research at hand explores the market potential of organic meat in Greece and emphasizes the perceptions about meat consumption held by organic consumers as opposed to those held by non-consumers of organic foods. It is expected that organic consumers will be more interested in a series of quality attributes of meat commonly found in its organic type, in comparison to non-consumers of organic food. However, the main finding of the survey is that consumer demands in relation to meat quality and safety are particularly high, irrespective of meat's production method. The research concludes that the particularly low consumption of organic meat in Greece should be partially attributed to its insufficient differentiation in consumers' minds.     

Exploring How Managers Conceive and Practice Market Orientation in Near “Perfect” Food Markets

Abstract

This paper explores what it means to be market-oriented in food commodity markets, i.e., markets that are near “perfect” as characterized in economics. This is an almost neglected topic in past research on market orientation. By eliciting how top managers in food commodity firms conceptualize market orientation, we reveal that their understanding and practice of market orientation partly deviates from the prototypical views reflected in the market orientation literature. Findings are discussed and implications highlighted.     

The effects of managerial attitudes to design on company performance

Central to current thinking on what makes companies competitive is the notion that “it's not what you do, it's the way that you do it”. The way a task is carried out in a company is itself very much related to the attitudes and opinions of the company's managers. This article focuses on top managers’ attitudes to product design and shows which ones are related to superior competitive performance. An examination of the attitudes shows that there are seven basic managerial orientations to design. The most successful orientation is called the “balanced orientation” and consists of attitudes that underpin a commitment to leading the field technically and making developments market‐relevant.     

A Case Study to Determine the Impact of Offering Selective Menus on Customer Satisfaction in a Health-Care Foodservice Operation

Abstract

In an effort to improve patients' satisfaction with healthcare foodservice, many hospitals are implementing a selective menu program. The purpose of this study was to identify the impact of a selective menu program on customer satisfaction in a health-care foodservice setting in Korea. The results of this study indicate that patients' perceptions of food and service dimensions are significant predictors of overall satisfaction with hospital foodservices. Patients who opted for a selective menu program at high levels of frequency showed more satisfaction with the selective menu program than those in the low-user group. “Food variety,” “taste,” and “offering nutritional information about menu items” are the key drivers of overall satisfaction.     

Factors Contributing to Internal Customer Satisfaction and Commitment in Quick Service Restaurants

Abstract

The fast-paced, highly competitive nature of quick service restaurants (QSRs) has motivated members of the industry to develop creative ways to optimize customer satisfaction. This search for competitive advantage has fueled an increased interest in employees as “internal customers” who are primarily responsible for external customer satisfaction. The hospitality industry is unique in that employees are part of the product; they directly provide the service component. This project surveyed over 900 hourly and salaried employees at 61 QSRs. The results indicate strategies and tactics to maintain satisfied and “actively” as well as “passively” committed employees. In turn these employees may be an employer's greatest marketing tool.     

Personal legitimising: A perspective of marketing management

This paper explains the basic social process of “personal legitimising” and illustrates its influence on marketing activity. Personal legitimising is the process by which individuals manipulate situations to suit their own agenda. The link between personal legitimising and an organisation's marketing activity was discovered using a grounded theory research strategy within a UK management consulting firm.

Personal legitimising has two groupings of behaviour, namely “obstructing existing marketing activity” and “driving new marketing activity”. Within the former are the categories of “stigmatising”, “pseudo endorsing” and “smokescreening”. The latter incorporates the categories of “latching on”, “self indulging” and “bragging”.

The paper has three parts. The first explains the basic social process of personal legitimising. The second shows how grounded theory methodology was used in this context. The third develops the possible contribution of personal legitimising to the understanding of marketing.     

College—Age Consumers' Knowledge and Perceptions of Food Irradiation

Abstract

This paper explores consumers of 18—24 years of age and their perceptions of irradiated ground beef products and role of irradiation on their purchase decisions. Data was collected with a survey of college—age consumers. Results showed that the majority of participants would be willing to purchase irradiated food products. Participants were somewhat concerned about impact of irradiation on safety and taste. The term “irradiated” and cost to consumer had a negative impact on participants' willingness to purchase irradiated ground beef products. The identification of the attributes should provide a useful guidance for the beef industry in terms of determining marketing strategies to increase the level of this segment of the consumer groups’ preference for irradiated products.     

Simulation Study on the Queuing System in a Fast-Food Restaurant

Abstract

The fast-food industry has experienced prosperous growth over the last three decades. In fast-food operations, the term “fast” refers to “quickservice.” The customers coming to a fast-food restaurant do not expect to wait for a long time to receive the food service. The waiting time for customers to receive the food service becomes one of the key quality characteristics in a fast-food restaurant. However, waiting lines always exist in a fast-food restaurant during peak hours. In this article, a simulation model is built to study the queuing system in a fast-food restaurant, which is located in the downtown area of the city of Touliu, Taiwan. From the results of the study, the manager of the restaurant should recruit another server during peak hours such that the customers' waiting time can be reduced. Meanwhile, the validation procedure for a simulation model is also briefly reviewed in this article.     

Multi-Attribute Dimensions of Service Quality in the Fast Food Restaurant Industry

Abstract

As the fast food restaurant industry grows in the Western industrialized world, it has also become increasingly competitive. In such an environment, marketers are concerned about how to increase or maintain market share through better service quality and effective segmentation strategies. This paper reports a two-phase exploratory study conducted to determine the dimensions of service quality in the fast food industry, from the consumer's perspective. Factor analysis revealed 10 dimensions made up of 57 different attributes. The 10 dimensions were able to discriminate among three groups of fast food patrons, namely: frequent, less frequent, and more frequent patrons. Managerial implications of these findings, for market segmentation, targeting, positioning, and promotional strategies are discussed.     

A Thirst for the Real Thing in Themed Retail Environments

ABSTRACT

The restaurant industry is experiencing a trend toward “authentic” ethnic restaurants that promise not only authentic food from a specific culture, but also an authentic dining experience and decor. For many consumers, these ethnic dining experiences constitute their sole contact with foreign cultures. This paper explores the importance of authenticity in ethnicthemed restaurants. It considers the methods employed and the frames of reference used to create these themed environments, consumers' abilities to delineate the real from the fake and the importance of authenticity as a component of the consumption experience. This exploratory study used qualitative research methods to report emerging themes derived from one type of ethnic restaurant, Irish pubs in Savannah, Georgia during St. Patrick's Day festivities. Managerial and research implications are offered.     

A Reply to “Business Marketing in Master's Programs: A Part of the Fabric”, But What If the Suit Differs?

ABSTRACT

In this reply to James Narus, James Anderson and Earl Honeycutt (NAH) we elaborate on the journey, a 25-year process, in teaching Business Marketing at Ivey. We further discuss the goal to elevate Business Marketing knowledge in the core of the program, rather than to build a strong specialization in the area. Inspired by NAH's reply, we then comment on the root causes of lack of progress at some schools in bringing more Business Marketing into master's programs, and we address the question, “What about those schools where the characteristics are different from Ivey, i.e., how far can our ideas be generalized?”     

Predicting the Lifetime Durations of Donors to Charities

ABSTRACT

Charitable organisations increasingly attempt to estimate the “lifetime values” of their donors with the intention of segmenting supporters and focusing resources and activities on high lifetime value givers. This paper contributes to the literature on donor lifetime value by presenting the results of an empirical study of the factors that encouraged donors to a certain charity to continue their relationship with the organisation. It emerged that the length of a person's association with the charity was significantly associated with two psychometric traits (involvement with charity giving and “helper's high”), four “exchange” variables (value and frequency of donations, number of charities supported and means of donation), and the strength of a person's inner feelings of enjoyment about being thanked for making a gift. Clear linkages between lifetime duration and the likelihood of an individual naming a charity as a beneficiary of his or her will were identified.     

The role of newly emergent wholesalers in the food and drink industry in Japan,c.1880 to 1940: Focusing on the case of Kokubu

Abstract

This article explores the historical development of Japanese wholesalers in the food and drink industry in modern Japan. Despite many criticisms of Japanese wholesalers as being “multi-layered,” “old-fashioned,” and “outmoded,” there were historical reasons for the existence of wholesalers. While the traditional wholesalers remained even after the Meiji Restoration, the new wholesalers emerged by dealing with new products that appeared for the first time in modern Japan. Utilizing the historical conditions of both producers and retailers, the newcomers such as Kokubu boosted their development by innovative activities and gradually superseded the traditional wholesale market, firmly establishing their position as general wholesalers before the Second World War.     

Marketing by CPAs

Abstract

Until the late 1970s, the AICPA discouraged commercial advertising and some other marketing tactics by practicing accountants. This study contacted 600 CPAs in the U.S. in an attempt to discover what kinds of marketing they employ, how useful they think it is, and how appropriate do they feel the AICPA's rules and regulations are in regard to marketing an individual CPA's services. Most thought the AICPA was fair. Accountants doing the most marketing tend to be younger males. “Conflict of Interest” was the area of most current concern in light of the ongoing problems of public accounting firms doing both auditing and consulting for the same client. “Newspaper” was the preferred advertising medium. Most of those surveyed were pleased the AICPA relaxed its restrictions on marketing and advertising, even though many CPAs still do not market their services to any great extent. This may change as younger accountants fill leadership positions in U.S. accounting firms.     

Tradition Versus Change: Evaluating the Currency of Some Traditional Chinese Values in Today's Business Environment

Abstract

In the last decade, the discussion about how marketing is changing has focused largely on practices in more affluent industrialized economies. Far less attention has been given to understanding the marketing strategies and practices of firms in emerging and transition economies. In this paper, we compare marketing of multinational firms versus local firms in Argentina. We identify the environmental characteristics of Argentina's emerging economy and, using survey data of 96 firms, we group firms into five clusters. We refer to two clusters as “traditional/local” as they use very basic marketing methods, with one serving business markets and the other consumer markets. The other three clusters we refer to as “progressive” as they represent state-of-the-art practices. The first two of these are foreign-owned and serve consumer and business markets, the third represents locally-owned service firms. The managerial implications are examined.     

Food or Medicine?

Abstract

Functional foods offer consumers a range of products that contain modified ingredients to treat specific diseases. The value of this product category has grown considerably since its introduction over a decade ago. This paper reports on qualitative research conducted into the choice criteria used for functional foods. It then compares these to the categories outlined in Khan's food choice model (1981) in order to determine whether functional foods should be treated as a food choice purchase. The findings of this research show that functional food can be treated as a food purchase because most of the choice influences found can be categorised into Khan's conceptualisation. However, additions and redefinitions are suggested. A separate category for family influence was found, as was the requirement to redefine “nutrition” within the model to accommodate the curative benefits of functional foods.     

Creating Value for Customers,Clients, Partners and Society: An Introduction to the Special Issue on Food Waste

ABSTRACT

Roughly one-third of edible food produced in the world is wasted, that is, it is never consumed by humans, despite the persistent demands for nutrition throughout the world. The American Marketing Association defines marketing as “…the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.” When it comes to food, an increasing number of these key stakeholders question how a global marketing system that routinely wastes a startling fraction of its product comports with “…value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large,” and whether the food marketing system can do more to sustainably convert scarce planetary resources into global nutrition. We introduce the articles in this special issue, which provide an intellectual and empirical basis for exploring how the global marketing system generates a substantial amount of food waste and how the food marketing system can do more to reduce the amount of wasted food.     

Perceptions of Governance in Africa

Abstract

This paper reviews a survey of 800 business leaders and civil servants in Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. Like most African countries, these eight countries have undertaken governance reforms over the past decade, trying to include a wider range of views expressed by organized interest groups in the formulation of economic and commercial policies. This survey aimed to learn how business and government leaders perceive those recent governance reforms.

First, do managers and civil servants see local trade associations successfully representing the broader business point of view with decision makers, and keeping their members informed of current and proposed public policies? Second, to what extent do perceived principal/agent tensions divide companies from “their” business associations? Third, how does industry structure affect perceptions of business association perfor mance? A fourth issue is whether perceptions exist of “bureaucratic capture” or of excessive state power over business associations in the sample countries.

Most respondents see major problems with governance, though across countries they report the impression of improvement and expect further gains. This raises the risk of unmet expectations should the pace of reform slacken. Business associations are reported to work reasonably well as policy advocates for better governance. They are seen as doing a fair job of keeping members updated on the policy environment. There was little difference in opinion between larger and smaller companies, and surprising overlap between the public and private sectors. These findings are grounds for wary optimism about business-government relations in the region.

Progress will not occur automatically, however. Companies in Africa need to redouble their government relations and policy advocacy activities. The region's industry and trade associations are promising vehicles for expressing the interests of the business community.     

The sociology of knowledge: Toward an existential view of business ethics

Business ethics is the study of ethics as it applies to a particular sphere of human activity. As such, business ethics presupposes a difference between an individual's experience within a business organization and his or her experience outside the organization. But how do we examine this difference? How do we discuss an individual's experience of “everyday reality”? What processes create and sustain this reality, and how does one's version of “reality” affect what is, and what is not, ethical? This paper outlines an approach to these questions based on theory from the sociology of knowledge, an approach which makes some progress towards making business ethics more existential. The sociology of knowledge, and particularly the social constructionist perspective, is concerned with how an institution creates “knowledge” and how this “knowledge” affects the cognitive processes of the individuals who make up the institution. The dialectic nature of the interdependent processes which shape both the individual and the organization are important in understanding how business ethics, as one kind of social knowledge, are enacted. Examining these processes leads to several interesting hypotheses about the nature of both the study and practice of business ethics. XXX“Only individuals have a sense of responsibility.” — Friedrich Nietzsche