An experiment on spatial competition with endogenous pricing

Hotelling's (1929) principle of minimum differentiation and the alternative prediction that firms will maximally differentiate from their rivals in order to relax price competition have not been explicitly tested so far. We report results from experimental spatial duopolies designed to address this issue. The levels of product differentiation observed are systematically lower than predicted in equilibrium under risk neutrality and compatible with risk aversion. The observed prices are consistent with collusion attempts. Our main findings are robust to variations in three experimental conditions: automated vs. human market sharing rule for ties, individual vs. collective decision making, and even vs. odd number of locations.     

Industrial Companies' Evaluation Criteria in New Product Development Gates

This article presents the results of a study on the evaluation criteria that companies use at several gates in the NPD process. The findings from 166 managers suggest that companies use different criteria at different NPD evaluation gates. While such criteria as technical feasibility, intuition and market potential are stressed in the early‐screening gates of the NPD process, a focus on product performance, quality, and staying within the development budget are considered of paramount importance after the product has been developed. During and after commercialization, customer acceptance and satisfaction and unit sales are primary considerations. In addition, based on the performance dimensions developed by Griffin and Page (1993), we derive patterns of use of various evaluative dimensions at the NPD gates. Our results show that while the market acceptance dimension permeates evaluation at all the gates in the NPD process, the financial dimension is especially important during the business analysis gate and after‐market launch. The product performance dimension figures strongly in the product and market testing gates. The importance of our additional set of criteria (i.e., product uniqueness, market potential, market chance, technical feasibility, and intuition) decreases as the NPD process unfolds. Overall the above pattern of dimensions' usage holds true for both countries in which we collected our data, and across firms of different sizes, holding different market share positions, with different NPD drivers, following different innovation strategies, and developing different types of new products. The results also are stable for respondents that differ in terms of expertise and functional background. The results of this study provide useful guidelines for project selection and evaluation purposes and therefore can be helpful for effective investment decision‐making at gate‐meetings and for project portfolio management. We elaborate on these guidelines for product developers and marketers wishing to employ evaluation criteria in their NPD gates, and we discuss directions for further research.     

How Critical is Employee Orientation for Customer Relationship Management? Insights from a Case Study

abstract    This paper explores the interface of employee orientation and the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) process based on an in-depth case study of a leading firm in the UK automotive services sector. Employee orientation is embedded in the Organizational Culture (OC) of the firm and manifested through its key elements, notably assumptions, values, behaviours and artefacts. CRM consists of four organizational activities: strategic planning, information, value creation, and performance measurement sub-processes. Based on the case study evidence, the widely postulated link between CRM success and employee orientation is empirically supported and the mechanisms underlying this association elucidated.     

The aims of business management

International joint ventures are progressively growing more important in LDCs. However, their activvities frequently lead to conflicts between such countries’ overall economic objectives and the aims of business management.     

Information demand and stock market volatility

We study information demand and supply at the firm and market level using data for 30 of the largest stocks traded on NYSE and NASDAQ. Demand is approximated in a novel manner from weekly internet search volume time series drawn from the recently released Google Trends database. Our paper makes contributions in four main directions. First, although information demand and supply tend to be positively correlated, their dynamic interactions do not allow conclusive inferences about the information discovery process. Second, demand for information at the market level is significantly positively related to historical and implied measures of volatility and to trading volume, even after controlling for market return and information supply. Third, information demand increases significantly during periods of higher returns. Fourth, analysis of the expected variance risk premium confirms for the first time empirically the hypothesis that investors demand more information as their level of risk aversion increases.     

The Theory of Planned Behavior in the Context of a Food and Drink Event: A Case Study

The present case study seeks to contribute to the culinary event management literature, investigating key motivators among participants to the Derbyshire Food and Drink Fair, United Kingdom. A questionnaire, which was partly based on predictors related to the theory of planned behavior was designed and distributed; 308 usable responses were collected. The validity and impact of attitude toward the behavior, perceived behavioral control, and subjective norms on behavioral intention was confirmed. Additionally, several motivators, such as “commitment and perceived importance,” “consumption and entertainment,” “attendance and discovery,” and “joining others” were identified as key factors. Finally, statistically significant differences were noticed among various participating groups, namely, in terms of age, gender, or distance traveled to the event. The findings have important implications for event managers and organizers, in terms of promotion, and addressing the needs and wants of various segments of food festival attendees.     

The Cinderella moment: Exploring consumers' motivations to engage with renting as collaborative luxury consumption mode

Past literature argued that the purchase of luxury goods is driven by people's motivation to conform or fit into our economic and social system. In this study, the authors focus on a new aspect of consumption, that is, renting instead of purchasing luxury goods, backed by the emerging opportunities of sharing economy platforms. Drawing upon the analysis of spontaneous consumers' online communications (in the form of tweets), this study aims to investigate the motivations to engage with luxury garment renting within a collaborative consumption context. To this end, a series of automatic content analyses, via two studies, were conducted using the tweets posted with respect to the Run the Runway collaborative consumption platform. Results demonstrate consumers' increased willingness to show their social status through renting rather than owning luxurious apparel based on five main motivators (need to wear new clothes for a special event, inspirations created by the products/brands, possibility to explore a new way of consuming luxury goods, need to make more sustainable choices, and to increase the life cycle of each luxury product). The implications of these findings are discussed, while they pave the way for future research in collaborative consumption of luxury retailing.