Using the Pack‐and‐a‐Half Rule to Eliminate Backroom Inventories in Retail Operations

In the retail industry, backroom inventories are typically associated with higher labor costs and greater operational complexity. Thus, retailers look for ways to eliminate backroom inventories. A heuristic used for this purpose is the pack‐and‐a‐half rule which suggests that the shelf space allocated for a product should be at least 50% larger than the case pack quantity in which the product is delivered. Despite its popularity among retailers, the pack‐and‐a‐half rule has been ignored in the academic literature. We introduce the pack‐and‐a‐half rule, assess its impact on a retailer's profits, identify cost, demand, and product characteristics driving this impact, and propose a modification. Based on an analysis of data obtained from a retailer on 1,986 SKUs in 20 categories, we find that the pack‐and‐a‐half rule decreases a retailer's profits, on average, by 10% when applied uniformly across all SKUs. Further, this decrease is significantly affected by product depth, product width, demand elasticity, case pack quantity, and inventory carrying cost. Finally, we develop a set of modifications based on these variables where the pack‐and‐a‐half rule is applied selectively and in a stepwise fashion. These modifications limit the decrease in a retailer's profits to a range between 6% and 7%.     

辐射迁移方程--一个K-辛空间上的正则方程

说明了均匀、轴对称、无源介质是一个K-辛空间上的Hamilton系统，Hamilton函数是系统的守恒量；数值计算辐射强度角分布的合理途径是将辐射迁移方程离散成以离散Hamilton函数为守恒量的有限维K-辛空间上的正则方程，并采用保离散Hamilton函数守恒的K-辛算法数值求解．     

电子商务环境下的中国现代物流研究

本文通过在电子商务环境下封中国现代物流业现状和问题的研究，得出中国应当通过电子商务的契机推动现代物流企业的网络化、信息化、标准化运营，实现物流业规模化发展，以提高中国现代物流业在全球的竞争力。     

试论生态林业系统的时空观

生态林业系统具有时间、空间两个序列的开发前景。长周期,大跨度的生态林业生产可以分解为复合的短周期方式,使生态意识与经济效益有机结合。空间组合的多层次立体开发有效地利用了光、热、水、土资源,并获得最大生物量;地域组合着眼宏观,注重研究大型骨干及网络性生态工程问题。     

第三方物流企业内部控制要素的建立策略

第三方物流企业作为一种新型行业，企业的发展已越来越受到企业内部控制薄弱瓶颈的制约．借鉴企业内部控制理论最新成果——企业风险管理框架（ERM）八要素理论建立和完善第三方物流企业内部控制，对该行业做优做强有着深刻的现实意义。     

On the test of the correction mechanism for mis-pricing between assets using a statistical yield spread model

This paper investigates the existence of a correction mechanism for mis-pricing between Japanese stock and bond. By this correction mechanism we mean that when deviations occur from the equilibrium levels of the expected return differentials between stock and bond — the risk premium differentials, the market will tend to correct the mis-pricing and bring the expected return differentials back to the equilibrium levels. We assume that the yield spread between the predicted earnings price ratio of stock and the yield to maturity of bond reflects the risk premium between stock and bond, and estimate the equilibrium risk premium differentials and mis-prices between stock and bond by modelling their behaviors with a statistical yield spread model (SYS). Empirical results strongly indicate the existence of the mis-pricing correction mechanism, suggesting the inefficiency of securities markets.     

Management of hybrid organisations: a case study in retailing

Hybrid organisations present important theoretical and managerial opportunities. We examine a large Finnish multichain retail organisation in order to identify and understand the challenges of hybrids in a retailing context. We are especially interested in how these complex firms try to maintain a balance between the centralised corporate control and the local autonomy and initiative of their retailers. The governance forms and processes identified in the case organisation are discussed with the help of a proposed conceptual framework. We believe that the identified governance problems and practices in the three different retail chains and especially our recommendations will facilitate the understanding of retail hybrid organisations and the management of hybrids in general.     

Equilibria in large economies with a separable Banach commodity space and non-ordered preferences

The purpose of this paper is to provide an existence result of equilibria for economies with a measure space of agents, a non-trivial production sector and an infinite dimensional commodity space. The commodity space is modeled by an ordered separable Banach space whose positive cone has a non-empty interior. The discretization approach proposed in this paper, allows us to extend the existence results in Khan and Yannelis [Equilibrium in markets with a continuum of agents and commodities. In: Khan, M.A., Yannelis, N.C. (Eds.), Equilibrium Theory in Infinite Dimensional Spaces. Springer, Berlin, 1991] and Podczeck [Economic Theory 9 (1997) 585] to economies with a non-trivial production sector and with possibly non-ordered but convex preferences as well as partially ordered (possibly incomplete) but non-convex preferences.     

Research on the Present Situation and Countermeasure of the Development of Chinese Architectural Industry

Along with the development of Chinese social economy and the innovation of government policy, Chinese Architectural Industry is playing a more and more vital role in the entire national economy. This paper first abstracts the connotation and basic characteristic of the Architectural Industry, then discusses the present situation of the development of Chinese Architectural Industry and carries on the analysis on the entire construction industry. Finally discusses the development tendency of Chinese architectural industry, and put forward the corresponding policy proposals to its developmental strategy.