Consumer Engagement through Conditional Promotions

This paper investigates consumers' response to conditional promotions (CP) offered in an offline retail store. Using qualitative research inquiry, we decipher the consumer decision-making process by finding the linkages between 'pre-cart' and the 'post-cart' add-on purchases. Thematic analysis of qualitative data (focus groups and personal interviews) resulted in four themes, i.e. 'Criticality of Product Utility,' 'Mode of Payments,' 'Loss Aversion by Consumers,' and 'Inability to Think Out-of-Box by the Consumers.' We add value to the existing marketing literature by finding the relationship between products purchased in 'pre-cart', i.e., without the knowledge of CP and 'post-cart', defined as add-on products added to the cart to avail the CP offer while purchasing in an offline retail store. Further, we find that consumers' willingness to avail CP varies with different relative distances from the target purchase cart value (high vs. low) and mode of payments (cash vs. digital). We discuss the theoretical and managerial implications of the research.

Economic loss, amount of beef discarded, natural resources wastage, and environmental impact due to beef discoloration

Consumers associate a bright-cherry red color of beefwith freshness and wholesomeness. Any deviation from a bright red color leadsto a discounted price or beef is discarded. Limited data is currently availableon the economic losses due to retail beef discoloration. Therefore, theobjective of the study was to estimate economic losses, the amount of beefdiscarded, natural resource wastage, and environmental impact due to beefdiscoloration. One-year data of total beef sales, total beef discarded, and discountedsale values were collected from two national retail chains and one retailstore. The two retail chains were located throughout the US, and the one retailstore was located in Southern US. The US beef system life cycle parameters frompublished literature were used to calculate the impact of discarded meat on waterand energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. The data from three stores weremodeled to calculate annual loss due to discoloration from the US retail beefsales. The data indicated that total beef sales from two major retail chainsand one retail store was 1.1 billion pounds of steaks and ground beef for theone-year period. This amount of beef corresponds to approximately 6.5% of totalretail sales of steaks and ground beef in the US. The amount of beef discardedfrom two major retail chains and one retail store corresponds to 29.7 millionpounds. Based on modeled data, the amount of beef discarded annually due todiscoloration within the US retail beef industry corresponds to 429 millionpounds, with another 1.8 billion pounds sold at a discount. The results indicatethat the US beef industry losses $3.745 billion annually due to discoloration. Thetotal amount of beef discarded per year in the US corresponds to 429 millionpounds, which represents wasting 780,000 animals and the associated naturalresources used in their production. A 1% decrease in discolored beef in the UScould reduce natural resource waste and environmental impacts by 23.95 billionL in water, 96.88 billion mega Joules in energy consumed, and 0.40 million tonsof carbon dioxide equivalent emission along the beef upstream value chain.Therefore, novel technologies to improve meat color stability could improvebeef production’s sustainability and limit wastage of nutritious beef.  

Omnichannel Marketing on Integrated Retail Store in Indonesia

Omnichannel marketing should focus on creating an immersive environment in order to create a seamless experience for the customers. In this research, we are looking into the omnichannel marketing applied by PT. Erafone DotCom to integrate their fairly new online platform with their existing physical store and the public perspective toward it. We find out that despite the public being familiar with their physical store, the public is still largely unaware and unfamiliar with the existence of eraspace.com as the online platform of Erafone thus rendering the omnichannel marketing to be less effective. We also look into the public perspective of the idea of omnichannel marketing that has been applied by PT. Erafone DotCom and analyze how to improve the public awareness about eraspace.com and what strategy to improve the omnichannel marketing that has been applied in order to create an immersive environment for the customers to have seamless experience in shopping with Erafone and/or eraspace.com.

Online Retail Store Community Engagement and Its Impact on Purchase Intentions in the Context of Online Reviews

Consumers want to engage with the retail store community in the shopping context. This study examines how consumers’ perceptions of source credibility and perceived usefulness of online reviews impact an intention to engage with the online retail store community and purchase intentions. The study also identifies differences when reviews are posted by customers versus store employees. Results show that the proposed relationships within the structural model are significant and reviews posted by store employees are seen as more credible, whereas reviews posted by other customers are perceived to be more useful. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.

The Influence of In-Store Ambience on Consumer Purchasing Behaviour

This study assesses in-store ambience or atmospherics of a selected apparel retail store to determine its possible influence on consumer behaviour at the selected store. Forty-five (45) walk-in customers were conveniently selected to participate in the quantitative, cross sectional study. The study concluded that there is a significant positive relationship between in-store ambience and consumer purchasing behaviour at the selected retail store. The study provides recommendations for both theory and practice

A Smart Shelf Design for Retail Store Real Time Inventory Management Automation

Conventional retail store inventory management systems rely on stockroom actions. However, especially in big scale retail stores, a certain amount of goods is placed on the display shelves. The items placed on the display shelves are not counted until their tags are identified by a cash register and marked as sold in the inventory management system. In this study, we propose a smart shelf that is capable of counting the specific items placed on it by detecting the location and the weight of the items. Our approach assumes that specific items in a retail store are placed in a specified location on each shelf, which is a widely preferred approach. The identified product information is then transferred to the inventory management system through the local network connection, and products on the display shelves can be counted in real time. The results show that the location and weight of the items can be identified with remarkable accuracy.

How location-based messages influence customers' store visit attitudes: an integrative model of message value

PurposeThis study aims to develop an understanding of how customers of a physical retail store valuate receiving location-based mobile phone messages when they are in proximity of the store. It proposes and tests a model relating two benefits (personalization and location congruency) and two sacrifices (privacy concern and intrusiveness) to message value perceptions and store visit attitudes.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses a vignette-based survey to collect data from a sample of 1,225 customers of a fashion retailer. The postulated research model is estimated using SmartPLS 3.0 with the consistent-PLS algorithm and further validated via a post-hoc test.FindingsThe empirical testing confirms the predictive validity and robustness of the model and reveals that location congruency and intrusiveness are the location-based message characteristics with the strongest effects on message value and store visit attitude.Originality/valueThe paper adds to the underexplored field of store entry research and extends previous location-based messaging studies by integrating personalization, location congruency, privacy concern and intrusiveness into one validated model.

A Study on Customer Perception Towards Supermarkets in Goa

People shift their buying from local retail stores to supermarkets, because of many reasons. This trend shift has not only been seen in metro cities but in small towns too. These change in perceptions of the customer insight the researcher and other stakeholder to study the reason behind it. This study tries to understand the demographic profile of the customers in Goa and compare the perception of customers towards supermarket and local retail stores. It has observed that people prefer supermarkets more as compared to the local retail store.