THE LAST MILE: AN EXAMINATION OF EFFECTS OF ONLINE RETAIL DELIVERY STRATEGIES ON CONSUMERS

The Internet has increased the level of importance of the end‐consumer market to transportation carriers. In two between subject experiments, carrier disclosure on retail merchant websites is examined as a strategic differentiation strategy. Predictions are offered concerning effects of carrier disclosure strategies on product delivery‐related expectations, consumer attitudes, and intentions to purchase a product online. Results from Study 1 reveal significant differences between disclosure and nondisclosure of the carrier for numerous product delivery‐related variables, as well as many differences between the six carriers examined in this first study. Study 2 extends these findings by showing that providing consumers with a choice of carrier leads to increased levels of satisfaction with the online experience and greater willingness to buy, relative to nondisclosure and disclosure strategies.     

The Asset Approach to Pricing Urban Land: Empirical Evidence

Many papers have attempted to explain Intelmetropolitan variations in the price of housing using multi-equation models of the metropolitan housing market. This paper uses a long-run equilibrium urban asset model to explain such variations. The model builds upon previous models that introduce uncertainty into the dynamic urban model of land conversion. The empirical results strongly support the asset approach to valuing land in urban areas.     

On Choosing Among House Price Index Methodologies

This paper compares housing price indices estimated using three models with several sets of property transaction data. The commonly used hedonic price model suffers from potential specification bias and inefficiency, while the weighted repeat-sales model presents potentially more serious bias and inefficiency problems. A hybrid model combining hedonic and repeat-sales equations avoids most of these sources of bias and inefficiency. This paper evaluates the performance of each type of model using a particularly rich local housing market database. The results, though ambiguous, appear to confirm the problems with the repeat sales model but suggest that systematic differences between repeat-transacting and single-transacting properties lead to bias in the hedonic and hybrid models as well.     

The Violent Rhetoric of Re-engineering: Management Consultancy on the Offensive

Business process re-engineering (BPR) was a leading form of organizational restructuring from the late 1980s until the late 1990s. This paper seeks to contextualize its development and account for its particularly bellicose language by reflecting on its historical antecedents in the west and its contemporary competitors in the east. We suggest that one way of reading BPR is as a form of ‘inverse colonization’ in which US managerial discourse both assimilated and revolted against the growing domination of Japanese thinking and practice. We conclude with some speculative comments on related causes of the rise of violent managerial rhetoric.     

The Impact of Environmental Contamination on Condo Prices: A Hybrid Repeat-Sale/Hedonic Approach

We extend the literature on the impact of externalities using an approach based on a hybrid of hedonic and repeat-sales methods. The externality in question is groundwater contamination in Scottsdale, Arizona. The use of condominium sales allows us to assume that major physical characteristics remain unchanged, but location parameters may be altered by urban growth and development as well as contamination. We find an economically significant discount for properties located in the contaminated area. Interestingly, it does not appear until several years after the contamination becomes publicly known, and it seems to have disappeared before the end of the study period.     

Consumer perceptions of tensile price claims in advertisements: An assessment of claim types across different discount levels

Findings are reported for two studies that examined the effects of three forms of tensile price claims (i.e., stating a minimum, maximum, or range of savings) on consumers’ price perceptions, search and shopping intentions, and estimates of price reduction across four different discount range levels. Hypotheses are offered based on a rationale drawn from an anchoring and adjustment framework. Results of both studies indicate that for broader discount ranges, tensile claims stating the maximum level of savings have more positive effects than those stating the minimum level or the entire savings range. For more narrow discount ranges, tensile claims stating the maximum level of savings appear to be no more effective than claims stating the minimum level or the entire savings range. He received his Ph.D. in Marketing from the University of Houston in 1988. Dr. Biswas’s work has been published or is scheduled to appear in the Journal of Marketing, Journal of Macromarketing, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Advertising, Journal of Consumer Affairs, Psychology and Marketing, and Journalism Quarterly, as well as other refereed journals and proceedings. He received his Ph.D. in Marketing from the University of Houston and a B.B.A. and M.B.A. from the University of Texas. His research has been published in the Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Public Opinion Quarterly, and others.     

The effect of enduring,situational, and response involvement on preference stability in the context of voting behavior

A conceptual model of the relationships between enduring, situational, and response involvement is proposed and tested in the context of decision-making associated with a political election. Specifically, the model concerns relationships between involvement, knowledge, confidence, and the stability of preference for a specific candidate over time. Empirical support for the proposed model is found, and implications for involvement researchers and political marketers are offered.     

An examination of free elicitation and response scale measures of feelings and judgments evoked by television advertisements

Recent research has examined the role of feelings and judgments evoked by television advertisements through the use of large batteries of rating scales. In this study, free elicitations of feelings and judgments about ads are compared to scale responses. Some potential problems pertaining to the use of large batteries of items to measure feelings and judgments are illustrated, and complementary aspects of the two measurement approaches suggest some advantages of the concurrent use of both in gauging responses to ads. Results across both approaches confirm the importance of assessing feelings in models of the antecedents of attitude toward the ad and suggest that feelings explain about as much variance in Aad as do judgments.