Slotting allowances: a time series analysis of aggregate effects over three decades

Slotting fees and related discounts are important but controversial mechanisms for obtaining shelf space in marketing channels for consumer packaged goods. The theoretical field is divided between the efficient market and the market power schools of thought. Results from empirical studies and analytical models point in different directions. This paper analyzes trends in key macro economic variables to see if the patterns are more consistent with an underlying market efficiency model vs. a market power one. The data span 30+ years and focus on retailers in the marketing channel for food and kindred products. The variables studied include new product introductions, retail selling area, consumer price indices, profitability, cost of goods sold and selling expenditures. Efficient market explanations do not fare well in the analyses in comparison with market power explanations for practically all the variables studied. The paper conlcudes with recommendations for regulators and retail management.     

Competing with emerging market multinationals

A new breed of multinationals from emerging markets is appearing in many industries. Western firms are wrong to underestimate, as they often do, the competitive threat from these firms. The discussion herein highlights the non-traditional competitive advantages these firms use to win at home and abroad and shows how these firms use internationalization not only to exploit competitive advantage but to bolster it. The article concludes with suggestions for how Western managers should respond to the competitive threat from emerging market multinationals.     

Supply chain agility: review,classification and synthesis

Supply chain agility (SCA) has emerged as an important capability to remain competitive in this era of business uncertainty and turbulence. This study aims to gain knowledge of the current state of research on SCA, specifically to have conceptual clarity and synthesise future research avenues. To achieve these goals, we have carried out a systematic review of 118 research papers on SCA published from 1999 to 2016. The findings suggest that the domain has witnessed steady growth since its inception, but little consensus has been observed around its definition and boundaries. To counter these definitional ambiguities, we have presented a comprehensive definition of SCA. The paper further discusses SCA along three thematic categories: the first considers SCA from the strategic perspective, the second considers SCA as a capability and focuses on its enablers and the third explores the impact of SCA on performance. Finally, towards the conclusion, a holistic framework summarising the findings is presented.     

基于卷筒纸胶印的印品在线缺陷检测系统

本文详细介绍了一种视觉系统,该系统可以实现对卷筒纸胶印过程中产生的印品缺陷进行检测和定位。具体来说,该系统能够对高速卷筒纸印刷进行实时监控,并且可在印刷过程中出现任何影响印品质量的故障（如结构缺陷、色彩偏差、漏字、墨点、墨杠等）时向操作人员发出警报。本文还介绍了机器视觉系统的硬件部分和用于彩色图像扫描及印品缺陷检测定位的图像处理算法。从本质上讲,该系统采用高速扫描算法检测图像的边缘和边界,利用线性和非线性的滤波器对动态大小、阈值和转换信息做进一步的分析。除了在实验室内进行实验以外,还建立了系统模型,系统模型可应用在卷筒纸印刷中,在真实条件下对模型的功能进行评价。将该系统安装在凹印机上进行实验,结果表明该机器视觉系统同样可以成功地对缺陷进行监控和检测。     

UNITARY VERSUS COLLECTIVE MODELS OF THE HOUSEHOLD: IS IT TIME TO SHIFT THE BURDEN OF PROOF?

Most development objectives focus on the well-being of individuals.Policies are targeted to increase the percentage of individualswho avoid poverty, who can read, who are free from hunger andillness, or who can find gainful employment. Individual welfare,however, is based in large part on a complex set of interactionsamong family members. Until recently most policy analyses implicitly viewed the householdas having only one set of preferences. This assumption has beena powerful tool for understanding household behaviour, suchas the distribution of tasks and goods. But a growing body ofevidence suggests that this view is an expedience that comesat considerable, and possibly avoidable, cost. The article arguesthat more effective policy instruments will emerge from analyzingthe processes by which households balance the diverse interestsof their members.      

The scarring effects of youth joblessness in Sri Lanka

Retrospective data on labor market spells for successive cohorts of youth in the school‐to‐work transition in Sri Lanka are used to examine whether early spells of joblessness lead to subsequent difficulty in finding or keeping a job. A balancing score approach is used to generate pairs of youth in the school‐to‐work transition who have similar expected levels of joblessness but who differ in realized levels of joblessness. Assuming that youth are not able to perfectly control whether they are employed or not employed, we argue that marginal differences in joblessness among otherwise observationally equivalent youth can be viewed similarly to a regression discontinuity in experienced joblessness. We find evidence of scarring in that spending the first year after leaving school without a job or training increases subsequent share of time spent jobless by 23–31 percentage points and lowers subsequent wages by 5.5%–7.5%.     

Contracts, norms, and plural form governance

The organization of interfirm exchanges has become of critical importance in today’s business environment. Many scholars have criticized the inadequacies of legal contracts as mechanisms for governing exchange, especially in the face of uncertainty and dependence. Other scholars argue that it is not the contracts per se but the social contexts in which they are embedded that determine their effectiveness. This study investigates the performance implications of governance structures involving contractual agreements and relational social norms, individually and in combination (plural form) under varying conditions and forms of transactional uncertainty and relationship-specific adaptation. Hypotheses are developed and tested on a sample of 396 buyer-seller relationships. The results provide support for the plural form thesis—increasing the relational content of a governance structure containing contractual agreements enhances performance when transactional uncertainty is high, but not when it is low. Implications for theory and future research are discussed. Joseph P. Cannon (Ph.D., University of North Carolina) is an assistant professor of marketing at Colorado State University. His areas of research interest include the effective management of business-to-business buyer-seller relationships in domestic and international markets. His research has appeared in theJournal of Marketing Research, theJournal of Marketing, theAcademy of Management Review, theJournal of Public Policy & Marketing, and other publications. He is a member of the Editorial Review Board of theJournal of Marketing. Ravi S. Achrol (Ph.D., Northwestern University) is a professor of marketing and global management research professor in the School of Business and Public Administration at George Washington University. Prior to joining George Washington University in 1991, he served for 10 years on the faculty of the University of Notre Dame. His areas of research interests include interorganization theory and marketing strategy. His articles have appeared in theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Marketing Research, Social Science Research, theJournal of Business Strategy, theJournal of Public Policy and Marketing, and various other publications. He is a member of the Editorial Review Board of theJournal of Marketing. Gregory T. Gundlach (Ph.D. J.D. University of Tennessee) is an associate professor of marketing in the College of Business Administration at the University of Notre Dame. His areas of research interest include theories of exchange governance, industrial organization, and antitrust policy. His articles have appeared in theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Marketing Research, Marketing Science, theJournal of Public Policy & Marketing, theJournal of Business Research, Antitrust Bulletin, and other publications. He is a member of the Editorial Review Board of theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, theJournal of Public Policy & Marketing, and theJournal of Retailing.