Would you Pay a Price Premium for a Sustainable Wine? The Voice of the Spanish Consumer

Sustainability has become one of the most important challenges for wineries over the last decade. From a marketing point of view sustainability can be considered as a way to differentiate wines to meet some market segment demands. Furthermore, this strategy can be also considered necessary to guarantee the future development of the wine sector. Given that some wineries have stated that production costs are higher for sustainable wines than for conventional wines, the goal of this paper is to analyze the premium price that consumers are willing to pay for a sustainable wine with respect to the price of a conventional wine with similar characteristics. Contingent valuation has been used to test the differences in the willingness to pay for sustainable wines among the main Spanish wine market segments. Results reveal that most Spanish consumers are willing to pay a higher price for sustainable wines, and that there are differences among the main market segments

Testing the decoy effect in the presence of store brands

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to test decoy effect in the framework of sales promotion, by conducting several experiments to figure out how this decoy effect is influenced by the presence or absence of a store brand. Design/methodology/approach – Several experiments have been conducted to test the validity of the decoy effect and rule out some explanations for the changes in demand that take place. The experiments consider three brands (two national brands and one store brand). All the brand names and prices employed in the experiment are real. Findings – The results indicate that, as expected, the inclusion of a decoy in the choice set significantly increases the consumer’s relative preference for the promoted product; however, more importantly, the results also show that store brand consumers are more influenced by a decoy than national brand consumers. Originality/value – This paper presents the first evidence of the decoy effect in the presence of store brands

Economic efficiency of members of protected designations of origin: sharing reputation indicators in the experience goods of wine and cheese

The aim of this paper is to analyse the economic efficiency of members of protected designations of origin (PDO). For the first time we analyse the value of PDO labels from the point of view of economic efficiency. The central hypothesis is that a PDO has a positive impact on the economic efficiency of its member companies and that this is because a PDO label is a collective reputation indicator that foments efficient investment in quality in terms of member returns. The methodology applied to test this hypothesis is based on data envelopment analysis to estimate economic efficiency, and econometric models to explain company efficiency through both the PDO label, as an indicator of collective reputation, and the characteristics of the company. The results obtained in the experience goods of wine and cheese in Spain show that PDO labels have a positive impact on economic efficiency. Additionally, the age and size of the company have a positive effect while the wage level of the company has a different influence on efficiency depending on the sector considered. Overall, the results reveal the importance of PDOs in industries in which the signal of reputation is not only reliant on the individual brands

The influence of size on winery performance: Evidence from Italy

The aim of this paper is to analyse the influence of firm size on the economic performance of wineries. To achieve this, the paper employs both different traditional profitability and productivity measures and a non-parametric technique to estimate efficiency as indicators of performance. Further, several parametric and non-parametric tests are used to analyse the influence of firm size on these performance indicators. Overall, the results obtained with a sample of 723 Italian wineries (limited companies and cooperatives) in 2013 show that size has a positive influence on the economic performance of wineries. Managers should be aware of the importance of monitoring their own performance in order to guarantee the competitiveness of their wineries

Sustainability in the Beverage Industry: A Research Agenda from the Demand Side

Sustainability has become one of the most important challenges for the beverage industry over the last few decades. In fact, many producers have implemented environmental, social, or economic aspects of sustainability at several stages of their production process. One of the reasons that might explain this interest in sustainability is that consumers are changing their behavior to integrate sustainable and environmental considerations into their purchase behavior. Accordingly, some consumers’ purchasing decisions are based not only on how well products satisfy their needs but also on how these products affect the environment or society at large. Within this context, designing appropriate interventions to fostering sustainable consumption requires deeper knowledge about its underlying determinants. In this paper, we focus on some of the most important challenges that might drive future research within this area

The Bundling Strategy: The One-Click Effect on Loss Aversion

This research aims to determine different levels of loss aversion in the context of price responsiveness and service bundling. Considering that nonlinearities in price responses may exist in a bundling strategy, this research tests the existence of different degrees of loss aversion, depending on whether an individual books one service independently of another (e.g., an airline ticket independently of accommodation) or as part of a bundle (e.g., a package that includes an airline ticket plus accommodation). We estimate a random parameter logit model. Empirical application shows that people who book a flight independently of accommodation are more loss averse than those who book a package that includes flight and accommodation. To explain this result, we propose the one-click effect so that people who find a price higher than expected (loss aversion) are more willing to accept it if the product is included in a bundle

Brand strategy scope and advertising spending: The more the better?

Given the need to justify business management expenses, firms are very interested in measuring marketing performance. The objective of this article is to analyze mass media advertising investment from an efficient point of view in hotel chains. To accomplish the objective, this article applies a two-stage double bootstrap data envelopment analysis to the monetary resources allocated to the different advertising media by the main companies in the Spanish hotel sector. The authors further investigate the determinants of hotel advertising efficiency in terms of the number of brands in the hotel portfolio and the combination of advertising media used (i.e. Internet advertising). The results show a certain level of waste of advertising spending by hotel chains and that both brand portfolio scope and Internet advertising positively affect efficiency.This work was partially supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities under research project INTETUR (RTI2018-099467-B-I00)

Sostenibilidad en el sector vinícola

La sostenibilidad representa uno de los principales desafíos a los que se enfrenta el sector vinícola. Dado que algunas bodegas manifiestan que los costes de producción de los vinos sostenibles son mayores que los costes de producción de vinos “convencionales” similares, el objetivo de este trabajo es analizar si los consumidores estarían dispuestos a pagar una prima de precio por comprar un vino sostenible con relación al precio que pagarían por comprar vino convencional de similares características. Los resultados del estudio revelan que la mayoría de consumidores están dispuestos a pagar una prima de precio por este tipo de vino y que existen importantes diferencias entre los diferentes segmentos de mercado

Advertising efficiency in the Spanish beer industry: spending too much?

Purpose - The main goal of this paper is to estimate advertising efficiency in the Spanish beer industry and to analyse the effects of several environmental variables and brand portfolio scope on advertising efficiency scores. Design/methodology/approach - A two-stage double bootstrap procedure is employed. In the first stage, advertising efficiency is estimated using a bootstrapped Data Envelopment Analysis on a multiple input-output model of advertising. In the second stage, a bootstrapped truncated regression model is estimated in order to identify the determinants of advertising efficiency. Both stages are estimated simultaneously. The empirical application is carried out on a sample of Spanish brewers between 2007 and 2014. Findings - Results show low advertising efficiency scores and highlight the effects that environment and brand portfolio scope have on these estimates. Originality/value - For the first time, this paper analyses the effect of environmental variables and the brand portfolio scope on advertising efficiency in the beer industry

Productivity growth in the winery sector: evidence from Italy and Spain

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to estimate total productivity change in the winery sector, decomposing it into efficiency change and technical change. Design/methodology/approach – The methodology is based on the estimation of the Malmquist productivity index for a sample of Spanish and Italian wineries between 2005 and 2013. Findings – The results show very low efficiency levels for the wineries under study. Further, Spanish and Italian wineries show a decrease in their average annual productivity for the period of time analysed. Practical implications – The analysis of the efficiency and the productivity of the wineries is crucial to improve their competitiveness and guarantee their survival. Originality/value – For the first time, a comparative analysis is carried out with data from two major wine-producing countries