The importance of key supplier relationship management in supply chains

Purpose: This paper investigates the impact of key supplier relationship management (KSRM) – understood as an aggregated supply chain management (SCM) process in the upstream direction – on the overall level of the execution of SCM within organizations. Methodology: A conceptual model is developed from a theoretical framework and proposes the capability to do KSRM as a mediator between internal and external SCM resources and SCM execution. A survey of 174 managers representing different supply chain stages is used to test the model through variance-based structural equation modelling. Findings: The findings reveal that external SCM resources directly affect the capability to do KSRM. Nevertheless, internal resources show a considerable indirect impact through external resources and can thus be considered an indirect determinant. The capability to do KSRM in turn impacts upon the level of SCM execution, measured in terms of the integration of business processes, directly and substantially, as well as mediating the effect between SCM resources and the level of SCM execution. Value: The main contribution of this paper is to empirically demonstrate the potential of KSRM for enhancing the level of SCM execution within organizations and consequently the level of integration in supply chains, leading to higher customer and shareholder value

Supply Chain Capabilities, Risks, and Resilience

Supply chain resilience is an operational capability that enables a disrupted or broken supply chain to reconstruct itself and be stronger than before. This paper examines resilience using the dynamic capabilities approach, grounded in the Resource-Based View of firms. The purpose of this research is to provide insights for achieving resilience by mapping the relationships between the practices, resources, and processes over which a manager has control. A survey of 171 managers is used to test a conceptual model that proposes relationship between supply chain capabilities and resilience as well as the moderating role of supply chain risks. Variance-based structural equation modeling reveals that only tighter integration between echelons and increasing flexibility lead to added resilience. The perception of supplier risk helps motivate the supply chain manager to enhance integration capabilities and thus achieve higher resilience. Furthermore, the perception of external risks to a supply chain actually reduces the effort of deploying external capabilities to obtain resilience. Overall, the findings strongly support the view that resources, routines, and capabilities provide different results in terms of resilience depending upon supply chain risk factors

Value-adding partnerships and co-opetition models in the grocery industry

Leading representatives of the European grocery industry formed the European Efficient Consumer Response (ECR-)Initiative in 1995. The goal of this strategic alliance is set to reengineer the way business is done in the industry by implementing cooperative strategies between retailer and manufacturer in order to fulfill consumer wishes better, faster and at less cost. ECR appears thereby in many facets, from a ‘simple’ dyadic value-adding partnership to a sophisticated form of co-opetition, where Supply Chain members have both relationship types – competition and cooperation – at the same time. Our paper discusses these issues first on theoretical bases and then presents empirical results of a comprehensive analysis within a selected European ECR-initiative showing the success factors of managing ECR-partnership relations

Urban Place Marketing and Retail Agglomeration Customers

Through identifying the attributes of a place that have an influence on the patronage behaviour of urban retail customers, this paper presents a conceptual model that proposes direct and indirect antecedents regarding the different retail-related dimensions associated with urban place attractiveness. An empirical study was conducted whereby the model was tested by surveying approximately five hundred actual consumers at the time they visited a particular town centre for the purposes of shopping. The results showed that the retail tenant mix, the merchandise value and the atmosphere had a direct impact and the product range and the sales personnel an indirect impact upon the evaluation of attractiveness. Furthermore, a number of additional effects towards these antecedents were identified with respect to parking conditions, the non retail tenant mix, manoeuvrability and orientation. This revealed that retailing activities were a major driver of attractiveness for an urban place. The practical implication of these findings suggests that place marketing activities should be proactive in supporting and enabling retailers in fulfilling their roles

Managing the Attractiveness of Evolved and Created Retail Agglomerations Formats

Purpose: This paper identifies those attributes of created and evolved retail agglomeration formats that have a substantial impact on overall attractiveness from the consumers’ point of view. From an agglomeration management perspective primary areas of concern are identified and suggestions to increase the competitiveness of diverse agglomeration formats are presented. Design/methodology: Through synthesizing pertinent literatures we produce a conceptual framework that proposes significant impacts between ten generic agglomeration attributes and different dimensions of attractiveness. We then test the hypotheses using a survey of more than 1,000 consumers of three competing agglomeration formats (a town center, a strip center and a regional shopping mall) in a particular locality. Findings: Retail related factors and the atmosphere influence attractiveness most significantly in each of the three settings. All other factors – in particular convenience related ones - show only format specific relevance or are of no direct importance on the consumers’ evaluation of attractiveness. Research limitations/implications: The findings can only be transferred to similar retail settings and do not consider supra-regional agglomerations. Practical implications: The results suggest that management of all three agglomerations is quite limited in directly influencing attractiveness. They should instead focus on the optimum selection of retail tenants and support or compliment the marketing endeavors of their tenants. Originality/value: The focus is on regional retail agglomerations and considers the interdependencies between different formats in one geographical area. The in-vivo survey approach takes into account the moderating effect of the shopping situation when consumers’ evaluate the attractiveness of competing shopping venues

Drivers of Agglomeration Effects in Retailing: The Shopping Mall Tenant's Perspective

Retail and service enterprises seek benefits and synergies from locating their stores within retail agglomerations, such as shopping streets and malls. The aim of this paper is to identify the main drivers of such synergetic or 'agglomeration effects' for tenants. A literature review reveals four sets of drivers that are related to the location, the tenant mix, the marketing and the management of an agglomeration. Based on a survey of 217 managers representing stores that are located in five regional and four supra-regional shopping malls, we demonstrate that location related drivers including geographical location, accessibility and parking conditions have a significant higher impact on agglomeration effects in terms of the economic success of tenants. The results were consistent amongst different types of tenants differentiated by store size, customer footfall, industry affiliation and perceived role within the respective mall (as footfall taker or generator within the network)

Hedonic and Utilitarian Shopper Types in Evolved and Created Retail Agglomerations

This paper focuses on the impact of hedonic and utilitarian values of shopping on retail agglomeration patronage issues, in particular on shopping behaviour and the perception of retail agglomerations. Our empirical study is based on a discussion of agglomerations’ potential to attract utilitarian and hedonic shopper types. A sample of 2,139 customers were interviewed in a peripheral shopping mall as well as on an inner city shopping street and confronted with a multi-item scale operationalising shopping values as developed by Babin et al. (1994). Using a standard fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm we identified four distinct shopper types. The results show that hedonists are represented by a higher number of females, earn lower individual incomes and are less educated compared to utilitarians. Interestingly, a higher share of hedonists visited the shopping mall. Overall, they make more shopping trips to agglomerations, stay there longer, visit more stores and – depending on the agglomeration format – spend less than or the same amount as utilitarians. Finally, we see that those customers who are attracted by agglomerations because of atmospheric and price stimuli are typical hedonists

Development and Empirical Test of a Grocery Retail Instore Logistics Model

The purpose of the paper is to introduce a model of Instore Logistics for retail stores. The model attempted to give a picture of all logistics processes that are carried out within a retail outlet from an incoming dock to the check out. The model has afterwards been empirically validated by analyzing the Instore Logistics processes of dairy products in 200 stores in the Austrian grocery retail sector. The findings of the survey show typical problem areas within store operations and identify the impact of the final 50 metres in the store as a key factor impacting upon the success of retail business. The paper continues the work of Raman, DeHoratius & Ton (2001) and Cachon (2001) and the findings contribute to close the execution gap in retail operations

Examining the role of store design on consumers’ cross-sectional perceptions of retail brand loyalty

This paper compares new and established store design prototypes of the same retailer to examine the role of consumers’ cross-sectional perceptions of retail brand loyalty. In-store surveys were administered to capture consumers’ store-level perceptions towards a new store prototype and an older established prototype of the same fast fashion retailer. The data was subjected to multi-group analyzes with structural equations modeling. The findings suggest that store novelty and complexity promote both store design pleasure and retail brand loyalty outcomes. The different store designs do not, however, account for differences in brand loyalty perceptions at the overall retailer level when multi-group comparisons of both store designs are made. Consumers of newer store designs are found to possess a heightened sensitivity to price perceptions. Managerial implications of the effects of store novelty and complexity on retail brand loyalty are also presented

The Consumer Direct Services Revolution in Grocery Retailing: an exploratory investigation

Purpose - To provide empirical evidence and explanation of the phenomenon that providers of home delivery of groceries are still of minor importance in highly concentrated retail markets. Design/methodology/approach - Based on a critical literature review three propositions were set up. A web based survey was conducted with two prospective consumer groups for home delivery providers: time starved consumers and consumers with Internet affinity. A structural equation modeling analysis was applied in addition to uni- and bivariate analysis. Findings - In contrast to some assumptions in the literature shopping in stores for groceries was not generally perceived to be an annoying activity. Respondents were aware of their own shopping logistics efforts in terms of spatial and temporal distance when shopping in stores but were unable to convert these efforts into costs. Any perceived inconvenience connected with shopping for groceries had no impact on respondents’ willingness to pay for home delivery services or their future intentions to use such services. Research limitations/implications - The study only investigated two specific consumer groups within highly concentrated urban grocery retail markets. However these groups may be considered typical of most western European countries and thus the study’s findings are of importance to retailers. Practical implications - The major findings suggest that in general home delivery service may not be considered a strategic competitive advantage in grocery retail markets. Other marketing issues such as pricing, assortment and store personnel still substantially affect a consumer’s choice of retail formats. This leads to the conclusion that home delivery providers should either appeal to niche markets and/or offer additional differential criteria compared to traditional retail formats. Originality/value - The paper argues for a different viewpoint for researchers investigating the topic of Internet-based distance retailing. Further, the reintegration of logistical tasks from consumers should not be considered detached from other format choice criteria