Unlocking the link between relationship duration and product De-listing in retail channels: The role of market orientation and brand diffusion

The literature on retailers' range rationalization is limited and focuses primarily on the consequences thereof from a consumer perspective. Drawing on the extant research on buyer-supplier relationships, brand management, and market orientation (MO) in business-to-business (B2B) markets, our research explores the antecedents of product de-listing in retail channels. It unlocks the link between relationship duration and product de-listing by examining the role of MO and brand diffusion. Using a combination of primary data with both objective and perceptual measures and proprietary objective data from a sample of suppliers to a large British supermarket, we find that the supplier's brand diffusion is an essential means of utilizing relationship duration between suppliers and retailers to reduce product de-listing in retail stores. Additionally, we find that MO plays opposite moderating roles in the links between relationship duration, brand diffusion, and product de-listing. It strengthens the negative influence of relationship duration on product de-listing, while it weakens the positive influence of relationship duration on brand diffusion. Our study contributes to research on marketing channels and B2B marketing by highlighting the limitations of relational view theory and unveiling the role of brand diffusion and MO in explaining the outcomes of buyer-supplier relationships in retail channels.     

香港娱乐明星古天乐600万建玩具王国

香港著名艺人古天乐虽然年届38岁，但仍然童心未泯，买玩具买到开仓储存，去年他斥资600万元在香港沙田买下一个960平方米的货仓来收藏心爱玩具，置身其中，令人无法置信自己是站在一个位于沙田火炭的货仓内。古天乐将货仓划分为收藏珍品区和优闲区，     

Brand and product attachment in an industrial context: The effects on brand loyalty

The role of attachment as a driver of industrial brand loyalty has largely been investigated at the inter-organizational level, while there is a notable lack of studies on industrial buyers' attachment to industrial brands and products. By researching an empirical setting in which buyers have first-person experience of product use, this study proposes the existence of brand attachment and product attachment in an industrial context and tests their influence on brand loyalty based on the results of a survey of 317 owner-operators of heavy trucks. Findings suggest that while brand attachment positively and directly influences brand loyalty, product attachment indirectly drives brand loyalty through the mediating effects of brand attachment. Product irreplaceability, however, was found to be a direct driver of brand loyalty. The current research also proposes tests to measure the relationship between the constructs of brand attachment and product attachment. This research has several managerial and theoretical implications indicating that paying attention to the emotional meanings of industrial brands and products is warranted, as are further studies on the application of attachment in industrial marketing.     

Role of resource gap and value appropriation: effect of reputation gap on price premium in online auctions

In this study, we draw on the resource‐based view of the firm and on value‐based models of strategy to examine when firms appropriate value from their superior resources. We argue for the need to take into account the role of the resource gap between competitors rather than the absolute resource stock of the focal firm when examining the resource‐performance relationship. In particular, we investigate whether the ability of a reputable seller to command a price premium is influenced by the reputation gap (i.e., the reputation differences between the focal seller and its closest competitor standardized by the reputation stock of both sellers). We test our hypotheses on 72 matched pairs of online transactions screened from more than 2,000 auctions of new mobile phones on the Polish Internet auction site Allegro. We find that the ability of a reputable seller to command a price premium (1) increases with the size of the reputation gap between the focal seller and its matched competitor, and (2) becomes increasingly smaller for each additional unit of the seller reputation gap. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Measurement,mitigation and prevention of food waste in supply chains: An online shopping perspective

This study introduces a framework and model, although applied in a practical setting, sets the stage for further theoretical development of mid-range theory. The methodology applied in the study has four main stages, namely interviews with managers from an online food retail supply chain, analysis of soft and hard data using questionnaire-based surveys of customers and suppliers, archival and factual information gathered from the supplier and the online food retailer to measure food waste across the supply chain and analytical models to quantify various effects. A number of propositions emerged from our multiple methodologies and observations. The major research contribution of this work is to advance Natural Resource Based View (NRBV) to the supply chain and various complexities involved in food waste management. Dynamic capabilities were clearly evident and necessary in rapidly changing industrial contexts such as online food supply chains. This paper also proposes a food waste minimization-and-mitigation model, establishes the direct and indirect outputs of food waste and brings attention of the food waste debate in the context of an exemplar online food supply chain, as well as provides a middle range theoretic framework to enhance understanding on theory and its application to this field informed mainly NRBV.     

消费者生成广告对顾客品牌选择影响的实证研究

生成广告对顾客品牌选择产生了重要的影响。基于消费者视角,调查了170位顾客,采用实证分析的方法,借鉴理性行为理论,研究了消费者生成广告对顾客品牌选择的影响。研究发现,顾客对消费者生成广告的感知效用、信任程度和主观规范都正向影响顾客对生成广告的态度,进而对顾客的品牌选择产生影响。同时也发现主观规范对顾客品牌选择意向影响不显著。根据结论提出如下启示:创造个性化的生成广告,提高感知效用;规范管理,提高信任度;合理利用生成广告,实现口碑营销。     

The impact of shopbot use on prices and price dispersion: Evidence from online book retailing

Internet price search tools, notably shopbots, have reduced consumers' search costs for price and product characteristics. While a variety of analytic models predict that increased consumer search will lower price levels among competing retailers, there is no consensus in the literature as to how price dispersion will change with increased consumer search. Moreover, there are no papers that have empirically tested these predictions using direct observation of variation in shopbot use over time.This paper examines the impact of changes in shopbot use over time on pricing behavior in the Internet book market. We do this by combining price and clickstream data collected from August 1999 to July 2001 — a period of rapid expansion in shopbot use. We find that a 1% increase in shopbot use is correlated with a $0.41 decrease in price levels and a 1.1% decrease in price dispersion.     

The effect of design protection on price and price dispersion: Evidence from automotive spare parts

The design right is a widely used but poorly understood intellectual property right that allows the protection of products’ aesthetics and outer appearances. We study the influence of design protection on price by exploiting cross-country differences in the scope of protection in the European automotive spare parts market: In some countries, repair parts are exempted from design protection, while in others they are not. Based on detailed price data, our difference-in-differences estimates imply that design protection increases prices by about 5–8%, with large differences between carmakers. We then link our findings to the literature on deviations from the law of one price. We document large cross-country price deviations for identical spare parts and provide evidence that a part of these price deviations can be explained by the lack of harmonization of design protection in combination with carmakers’ pricing-to-market strategies.     

Industry structure and the choice of product reliability

Epple and Raviv (1979) and Saving (1982) argued that product reliability may be independent of market structure. Using a two period oligopoly model we show that this conclusion is correct only if the firms are risk-neutral and output is rented. If either of these conditions is violated, the firm's reliability will not be socially optimal. Our results provide further rationale for Avinger's (1981) empirical findings on product obsolescence in the vacuum tube and electric lamp industries. We do find, however, that the independence result can be reestablished in sales markets if firms are required to provide warranties.     

The impact of sellers' social influence on the co-creation of innovation with customers and brand awareness in online communities

This study integrates theoretical concepts adopted from social influence theory, co-creation practice, and brand equity into a single model by examining the role of social comparison and social identity in co-creation activities in an online community context, which is known to affect firms' brand awareness in the Business-to-Business (B2B) marketplace. The model was tested using a dataset gathered via an online survey of four online communities discussing Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) related issues in LinkedIn. Empirical findings from our survey of 190 business professionals indicate that sellers' social identity and social comparison are key facilitators for developing a series of co-innovation activities, and confirmed that co-innovation practices make potential customers more aware of company brands. The results of this study provide new insights into effective B2B social media marketing techniques by elaborating how best to orchestrate co-innovation with online communities to boost brand awareness.     

The choice between resale price maintenance and exclusive territories: Evidence from litigation

A manufacturer's choice between resale price maintenance (RPM) and exclusive territories to protect dealer provided services is examined empirically. The relative efficacy of RPM in solving the free rider problem depends on the life cycle of the product being distributed. A manufacturer of a product with a long life cycle is more likely to protect its dealers' investment in service with exclusive territories, whereas RPM becomes the more probable restraint for products of short life spans. Data gleaned from vertical restraint litigation strongly support this hypothesis.The author wishes to thank Howard P. Marvel, Laura A. Boyd, and two anonymous referees for comments on earlier versions of this paper. The financial support of The Procter and Gamble Fund is also gratefully acknowledged. Any errors are mine alone.     

Multiproduct retailing and consumer shopping behavior: The role of shopping costs

We empirically examine the role of shopping costs in consumer shopping behavior in a context of competing differentiated supermarkets that supply similar product lines. We develop and estimate a model of demand in which consumers can purchase multiple products from multiple stores in the same week, and incur transaction costs of dealing with supermarkets. We show that a similar model without shopping costs predicts a larger proportion of multistop shoppers and overestimates own-price elasticities and product markups. Further, we use our model along with a model of competition between supermarkets to study two practices that are commonly used by supermarkets: product delisting and loss-leader pricing. We show that the presence of shopping costs makes product delisting less profitable whereas it makes loss-leader pricing more profitable compared to a context in which consumers do not incur shopping costs.     

The effect of new product development techniques on new product success in Spanish firms

The rate of market and technological changes has accelerated in the last years. This turbulent environment requires new methods and techniques to bring successful new products to the marketplace. Much attention has focused on new development techniques, but little empirical research has been conducted to validate these techniques. In this study, the relationship between popular new development techniques and new product success is examined. Our findings suggest that only a subset of these popular techniques is significantly related with new product success in Spanish firms. The study also identifies the main contributors to new product development (NPD) effectiveness in Spanish firms.     

The effects of perceived corporate brand personality on individuals' exploration and exploitation orientations: the moderating role of self-brand connection

Our knowledge is limited regarding the psychological antecedents of individuals' exploration and exploitation in general and regarding the identity-related antecedents in particular. The corporate brand of the organisation we work for is an important element of our collective identity, and the way we perceive the corporate brand personality of our organisation affects how we define ourselves. In this paper, using data from 417 individuals working in sales-related jobs and taking the behavioural strategy perspective, we examine the effects of perceived corporate brand personality on the individuals' identities and, therefore, strategic tendencies. More specifically, we find that the responsibility and activity dimensions of the corporate brand make the corresponding aspects of employees' identities more salient and affect their orientations towards exploration and exploitation. We also investigate the moderator role of the self-brand connection. This paper has contributions and implications, especially for the literature on exploration–exploitation at the individual level.     

用户选择广告模式对广告效果影响的眼动研究

通过眼动技术与认知问卷调查相结合的方式,测量被试男女在用户选择广告模式/强制广告模式下观看广告的眼动数据,研究了广告模式和被试性别因素对广告效果的影响。结果表明,相对于传统的强制广告模式,用户选择广告模式下,受众对广告的注意力有显著提升,对广告中的文案记忆效果也好,同时,受众性别对广告效果也会产生影响。     

Product competence exploitation and exploration strategies: The impact on new product performance through quality and innovativeness

The ability to manage existing assets and capabilities (exploitation) and the development of new capabilities (exploration) are arguably among the most relevant new product success factors. However, while exploitation-related capabilities are based on certainties regarding the efficiency of a company, exploration-related capabilities require the analysis of new technologies and processes. In existing literature, there is a gap concerning the trade-off between the exploitation and exploration of competences. Based on the theoretical background of Resource Based Theory, Dynamic Capabilities Theory and Discovery and Creation Theory, a model is proposed to analyze this gap. In this study, which examines 197 manufacturing organizations, we build on the dualities of the two types of competences and their impact on speed-to-market and market performance. The findings indicate that the choice between exploitation and exploration depends on the goals of new product development. While exploitation increases product objective quality, exploration enhances product innovativeness to the firm. Furthermore, we found that both exploitation and exploration constitute important success factors when it comes to launching new products. Finally, moderate effects of competitive intensity and market turbulence are also examined. High levels of market turbulence improve the results of exploitation, while low levels of competitiveness may encourage exploration.     

The effect of coal combustion byproducts on price discrimination by upstream industries

Price discrimination is often difficult to disentangle from price dispersion due to a lack of transaction level data capable of tracking sales from individual companies to quantifiably heterogeneous groups of consumers. This paper uses mine-mouth prices and transportation prices paid by regulated coal-fired power plants in the U.S. coal market during the time period 2009–2010 to study how coal mines and transportation companies practice price discrimination against electricity plants. Power plants with heterogeneous demand for coal are perfectly identified based upon their ability to market flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) gypsum, which is a byproduct produced from scrubbing SO₂ emissions. Because sulfur is the raw material for FGD gypsum byproduct production, gypsum sellers are anticipated to have a more inelastic demand for high-sulfur coal. Results indicate that coal mines and transporters charge higher prices to gypsum sellers in comparison to non-sellers for transactions originating at the same mine during the same month of the same year. Coal-fired power plants capable of selling FGD gypsum byproducts are estimated to pay a 10.3–39.6 ¢/MMBtu price premium for coal. Coal mines and transportation companies each capture a relatively equal share of the associated rents.