Technology and intermediation: do banks pass the gains to their customers?

A key function of the banking system is to facilitate intermediation between borrowers and lenders. In this paper we single out for attention the money transmission function of banks to test whether intermediation costs have been reduced by technology and passed on to consumers. Using data for the commercial banking sector in Ireland over the period January 1986 to August 1996, we find that the gains from technology in the provision of banking services, provided they exist, have not been passed on to the bank customers in the form of a lower bank interest rate spread.     

How do consumers co-create their experiences? An exploration in the heritage sector

Abstract

Whilst the body of work around co-creation has grown, co-creation continues to be considered from a value perspective with key questions, such as what is actually being co-created, remaining unanswered. This article moves beyond value to experiences and explores co-creation of the consumption experience. The research examines the manifestations and antecedents of co-creation of the consumption experience from a consumer angle and presents a co-creation framework. Customer critic analysis with consumers from two exemplar heritage organisations is used to investigate co-creation. The findings illuminate three facets of co-creation: co-production, engagement, and personalisation. This paper addresses a gap in Service-Dominant Logic theory, arts/heritage, and broader marketing literature by distinguishing between co-creation of value and co-creation of the consumption experience and proposing a definitive conceptualisation of the latter. The proposed model progresses the co-creation discussion to an empirical level and provides a foundation for future research.     

It's the little “stings”: Racial microaggressions against Asian American customers in retail and their effects

Racial discrimination frequently occurs in the retail context. Yet, research has neglected to investigate the experiences and effects of racial microaggressions against Asian Americans in retail. To close this gap, the researchers opted for a mixed-method design combining one-on-one semi-structured interviews and online experiments. The findings in Study 1 show that Asian American customers face more racial microaggressions that are low in racial loading than are high. In Studies 2 and 3, the results indicate that participants in the high racial loading conditions feel higher degrees of anger and shame than those in the low racial loading conditions. Moreover, participants in the high racial loading conditions show lower repatronage intentions and higher word-of-mouth intentions than those in the low racial loading conditions. Also, anger has a stronger association with behavioral intentions than shame. This research adopts the attributional ambiguity theory to understand the psychological processes and effects of racial loading in microaggressions.     

How do customers meet their needs in in-store and online fashion shopping? A comparative study based on the jobs-to-be-done theory

Understanding customer needs is key for fashion retailers to stay competitive and innovative. Surprisingly, however, extant literature mainly explores customer needs in terms of a garment and its attributes rather than viewing shopping as a problem-solving process to meet customer needs. Moreover, these studies fail to address how customers meet their needs in-store (ISFR) and online fashion retailing (OFR). To fill this research gap, we empirically investigate customers' personal and social needs and how they can be met through the jobs-to-be-done theory. Findings reveal that, beyond the purchase of a garment, customer needs can be fulfilled through different ways, such as smart technology or a person's high interaction with social others in ISFR and the online shop experience or a social linkage without social interaction in OFR. Additionally, our findings offer potential service innovations for fashion retailing managers.     

Bridging the valuescape with digital technology: A mixed methods study on customers’ value creation process in the physical retail space

This mixed methods study investigated how value is created in the physical retail space and how the customer experience is influenced by digital technology. A cross-sectional survey, with both qualitative and quantitative components, was distributed across a heterogeneous sample of 832 customers. The results revealed an overarching model comprised of three interrelated clusters: customer, service provider, and digital technology. We propose that this model can be understood as a valuescape, where customers' specific goals, needs, and desires drive them to interact and co-create value with service providers in the physical retail space, with digital technology either enhancing or disrupting this value co-creation process. The results also show that the importance of aligning digital solutions with customers’ drives increases at the same pace as reliance on technology. The findings offer guidelines on how to utilize digitalization to leverage customer experiences and thus strengthen the attractiveness of physical retail spaces.     

“Fairtradization”: a performative perspective on fair trade markets and the role of retail settings in their enactment

In line with the Callonian approach in economic sociology, this paper introduces the concept of “fairtradization” to analyze the assemblages of human agents, material devices, and discourses through which the fair trade market is enacted. We argue that the retail setting is a key site for the enactment of particular versions of “fair trade,” focusing on a case study of the newly designed world shops in Flanders (Belgium). We reveal that the new shop design – aimed to address particular overflows resulting from the mainstreaming of fair trade – constitutes a multivocal shopping environment that enables four analytically distinct enactments of fair trade shopping. Our analytical approach opens up a more dynamic and complex understanding of fair trade beyond the unidirectional diagnosis of mainstreaming. More generally, it provides support for a radically performative view of consumption markets, pointing to the importance of retail settings as socio-material spaces for their enactment.     

How do customers engage in social media-based brand communities: The moderator role of the brand's country of origin?

Across the globe, companies increasingly use social media-based brand communities (SMBBC) to facilitate customer engagement (CE). This study clarifies the relationship between brand trust and CE in SMBBC, which is often inconsistent in previous literature. Drawing on the uses and gratifications theory, we examine the motivations that drive customers' active and passive engagement behaviors. Additionally, this study employs multi-group analysis to compare the differences in the customer engagement process concerning the brand's country of origin. The empirical results demonstrate that brand trust is an antecedent to customer engagement in a long-term relationship. Brand affiliation, entertainment, and investigation prompt customers' active and passive engagement behaviors; the opportunity-seeking only encourages the passive engagement, but the motivation of conversation prompts neither active nor passive behaviors of the customers. Notably, there is no significant difference in Chinese customer engagement between domestic and foreign brands on Sina Weibo. The research enriches the understanding of customer engagement in SMBBC and provides valuable insights for international brands keen on the Chinese market.     

How do economic,cultural, and global-connectedness distances moderate the effect of customers’ experiences on their intention to revisit non-indigenous restaurants? Evidence from Korean restaurants

In this study, we evaluate how the effect of customers' experiences on revisit intention for non-indigenous restaurants can be moderated by economic distance (ED), cultural distance (CD) and global-connectedness distance (GD) between the country of origin for a given non-indigenous restaurant and the customer’s resident country. Surveys were conducted in seven countries across three continents, and the levels of ED, CD and GD between Korea and the seven countries were used as moderators. The findings suggest that the types of food and staff are two elements that should be emphasized in countries that are relatively close to Korea. Conversely, elements like the atmosphere of the restaurant and word of mouth should be emphasized in countries that have greater distances from Korea. Of the three distances considered in the study, GD had the strongest moderating effect on the relationship between customers’ experiences and their intentions to return to the restaurant. As a whole, the results imply that ED, CD and GD are important points of reference when considering prior experience while selecting a target country based on the strength of the restaurant’s experience management.     

Do consumers act in a sustainable way using their refrigerator? The influence of consumer real life behaviour on the energy consumption of cooling appliances

Over recent decades, energy savings and resource conservation have become increasingly important issues for debate, and this includes the residential sector. Since the introduction of the European Energy Label, the energy consumption of appliances has decreased drastically. Additionally, a number of guidelines have been published to assist the consumer in adopting more energy‐saving behaviours. Refrigerators and freezers in particular are covered by these recommendations because they are large energy consumers in domestic households. In order to understand the influence of consumers' real life circumstances and their behaviour in relation to the energy consumption of refrigerators, a web‐based survey was carried out. A total of 1011 participants in four European countries completed a questionnaire to allow the researchers to gain information about refrigerator characteristics and consumer behaviour in relation to refrigerator use. As well as demographic and socio‐economic characteristics of the participants, data were collected on refrigerator configuration and specification, ambient conditions (ambient temperature, position near any heat sources), and consumer behaviours such as shopping frequency, loading of the refrigerator, door opening and food consumption. The study has shown that recommendations on energy efficient usage are not always observed. A major finding of the present study is that for 25% of refrigerators, correct operation is not ensured as these appliances are operated outside the temperature ranges specified according to their climatic classes. This suggests a lack of consumer information on this topic. Consequently, guidelines and recommendations will have to be revised and their dissemination to be improved in order to ensure the sustainable and safe use of domestic refrigerators.     

The impact of the deregulation of retail hours on shopping trip patterns in a mall hierarchy: an application of the RASTT model to the Sydney Project (1980–1998) and the global vacant shop problem

The impact of the deregulation of trading hours on trips to planned shopping centres is studied using the retail aggregate space-time trip (RASTT) model, where changes in consumer spatial behaviour are analysed at three malls in seven year periods (1980/82, 1988/89, 1996/98) in Sydney, Australia (The Sydney Project). After effective deregulation in 1992, the subsequent repeat samples in a hierarchy of shopping malls show significant structural change in only the afternoon samples at community and regional planned shopping centres. The results show a substantial increase in the attractiveness of planned shopping centres over traditional retail centres, where less consumers are shopping locally. There was a shift in spatial demand towards Sunday for ‘small centre’ behaviour and the appearance of high frequency regular trips to the regional planned centre. The RASTT model suggests that these changes in the structure of consumer behaviour are a result of moving the time boundary to seven days-a-week shopping at these centres. These structural changes may account for the on-going long term vacant shop problem that has manifested itself under shopping hour liberalisation in south east Australian, British and Canadian traditional retail hierarchies in the 1990s.     

Increasing customer loyalty and WOM in an age of terror: Cross-cultural development and validation of the customers’ reactions to terror scale (CRTS)

The threat of terror places customers in a vulnerable situation, giving rise to a variety of protective behaviors. The ability to employ these behaviors dictates customers' preferences for specific services. To enable a better understanding of this dynamic and its implications for positive customer outcomes, the current study developed a customers’ reactions to terror scale (CRTS) in a four-stage process. Data were collected from customers in France and Israel across two service contexts, hospitality and public transportation. Nomological examinations showed that services that enable customers to employ protective behaviors under the threat of terror can facilitate increased loyalty and word of mouth (WOM).     

Environmental Respect: Ethics or Simply Business? A Study in the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) Context

In recent years there have been ever-growing concerns regarding environmental decline, causing some companies to focus on the implementation of environmentally friendly supply, production and distribution systems. Such concern may stem either from the set of beliefs and values of the company’s management or from certain pressure exerted by the market – consumers and institutions – in the belief that an environmentally respectful management policy will contribute to the transmission of a positive image of the company and its products. Sometimes, however, ethics and market rules are not enough to deal with this situation and specific laws must be considered. This is the case when companies base their activity on the ‹ethics of self-interest’ concentrating their efforts on projecting an adequate image – e.g. environmental respect – rather than fundamentally behaving in environmentally respectful ways. This article, taking as reference the SME context, discusses the reasons for implementing environmentally friendly systems. Both ethics and business seem to be relevant and, therefore, a certain balance between market and interventionism seems to be necessary.     

The UK National (and Scottish) Vocational Qualification System: State of the Art or in a State?

The creation of a new competence-based framework of National (and Scottish) Vocational Qualifications (N/SVQs) in the UK has been fraught with difficulties and the ensuing debate has sharply divided those involved in education and training. Some argue that the N/SVQs are doomed to failure because the underlying philosophy is fundamentally flawed or see their introduction as part of a political conspiracy of the right to wrest power away from liberal educationalists; others see national standards and N/SVQs as a way of ensuring that education and training better meet the needs of employment; a few hold on to the original idealistic vision of opening up access to qualifications and giving credit where credit is due, especially for those workers who have been disadvantaged in the education system. Early implementation has been puncuated by scandals and, with a few notable exceptions such as the Care Sector, take-up rates have fallen well below what is necessary for achievement of National Education and Training Targets for the year 2000. In 1996, the publication of three major reviews of 16–19 qualifications, of assessment in General National/Vocational Qualifications and of the top 100 most commonly used N/SQVs, marked a crisis in confidence in the emerging UK system. Yet variations on the outcomes-based approach established by NCVQ/SCOTVEC are increasingly finding favour in the European Union and in New Zealand, Australia and the new South Africa, not least because they hold out the promise of greater transparency for all stakeholders. Extensive changes are now anticipated but they may be too little too late to get this radical innovation back on course.     

Networks of power and networks of capital: evidence from a peripheral area of the first globalisation. The energy sector in Naples: from gas to electricity (1862–1919)

At the moment of Italian political unification, the Mezzogiorno (i.e. Southern Italy) was affected by a deep institutional change and it entered the wave of financial market openness, attracting all forms of investments from international capital markets. Naples – after having lost its previous role as the Bourbon kingdom’s capital city – enabled projects of large scale urban planning, beginning with basic public utilities. In this process, public and private lighting was chronologically the first area of interest – parallel with railway development planning – where international finance played a role. As evidence of the dynamics which brought this peripheral European area into the orbit of the first globalisation, this article addresses the complex business of energy supply in Naples – between 1862 and World War I – both from the point of view of its financial dynamics and the parallel evolution and organisational characteristics of the business actors involved. The Social Network Analysis (SNA) will support the reconstruction of the diversified and transnational businesses which the Neapolitan energy business was integrated in, at the same time giving evidence of both the bindings linking legally independent companies and the multiple relations between the actors involved. The transition from gas to electricity during this time marked the transition from weak to strong corporate ties according to the evolutionary trends both of technology and international financial markets.