Retail
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- 26 Jun 2017
- Research & Ideas
How Cellophane Changed the Way We Shop for Food
Research by Ai Hisano exposes cellophane's key role in developing self-service merchandising in American grocery stores, and how its manufacturers tried to control the narrative of how women buy food. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 17 Jun 2017
- Research & Ideas
Amazon, Whole Foods Deal a Big Win for Consumers
What does Amazon's $13.4 billion deal for Whole Foods say about the future of retail? Harvard Business School professors Jose Alvarez and Len Schlesinger see good times ahead for consumers as well as both companies. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 31 May 2017
- What Do You Think?
Can Amazon Do What Walmart Couldn’t, Stop the 'Wheel of Retailing'?
SUMMING UP Is Amazon's growing retail power capable of breaking the "wheel of retailing" theory? James Heskett's readers weigh in. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 29 Mar 2017
- Research & Ideas
The Story of Why Humans Are So Careless With Their Phones
Consumers act more recklessly with the products they own when better versions become available, according to research by Silvia Bellezza, Joshua M. Ackerman and Francesca Gino. This comic by Josh Neufeld explains. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 13 Mar 2017
- Research & Ideas
Hiding Products From Customers May Ultimately Boost Sales
Is it smart for retailers to display their wares to customers a few at a time or all at once? The answer depends largely on the product category, according to research by Kris Johnson Ferreira and Joel Goh. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 06 Mar 2017
- Research & Ideas
Why Comparing Apples to Apples Online Leads To More Fruitful Sales
The items displayed next to a product in online marketing displays may determine whether customers buy that product, according to a new study by Uma R. Karmarkar. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 20 Feb 2017
- Working Paper Summaries
Where Should We Build a Mall? The Formation of Market Structure and Its Effect on Sales
In spite of the recent surge in e-commerce, brick-and-mortar retail, specifically in the form of large-scale shopping malls, is still the dominant venue for consumer purchases in the developed world. The construction of mass-scale shopping malls has also experienced tremendous growth in newly industrialized countries such as China. This research provides a rigorous, yet practical, framework to understand and evaluate why retail stores join a shopping mall and how their decisions affect mall revenue. The model can be extended and applied to a number of settings where a decision maker must choose among alternative sites to construct a market, for example, for transportation hubs such as airports or train stations.
- 30 Jan 2017
- Working Paper Summaries
The Environmental Legacies of The North Face's Doug Tompkins and Patagonia's Yvon Chouinard
The contrasting strategies taken by founders of Patagonia and The North Face provide a new lens on current debates about the ability of business to contribute to environmentalism. This paper suggests that the strategies of both founders bring positive environmental benefits but with trade-offs and limitations. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 21 Dec 2016
- Cold Call Podcast
Target's Expensive Cybersecurity Mistake
Professor Suraj Srinivasan explores one of the largest cyber breaches in history, analyzing why failures happen, who should be held accountable, and how preventing them is both a technical problem and a matter of organizational design. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 08 Dec 2016
- Cold Call Podcast
How Wayfair Built a Furniture Brand from Scratch
What was once a collection of 240 home furnishing sites is now a single, successful brand, Wayfair.com. How that brand developed over time and the challenges and opportunities presented by search engine marketing are discussed by Thales Teixeira. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 06 Dec 2016
- Working Paper Summaries
Assortment Rotation and the Value of Concealment
Assortment rotation is the retailing practice of changing the assortment of products offered to customers throughout a selling season. It is used by both brick-and-mortar and online retailers as a strategy for gaining competitive advantage. This paper studies assortment rotation in product categories such as apparel, accessories, and toys, where consumers typically make multiple purchases during a season. The authors identify and explain a new reason for retailers to frequently rotate their assortment: Consumers may purchase more products throughout the selling season if a retailer conceals a portion of its full product catalog from consumers by rotating its assortment. Aside from its scholarly contributions, the paper provides practical insights to retailers to guide their assortment rotation strategy decisions.
- 16 Nov 2016
- Research & Ideas
Turning One Thousand Customers into One Million
In the second part of a series on growing startups, Thales S. Teixeira explains how Uber, Etsy, and Airbnb climbed from one thousand customers to one million. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 19 Oct 2016
- Book
Three Critical Mistakes Digital Businesses Make With Content
Do companies really understand the nature of today's digital transformation? Bharat Anand's book The Content Trap offers a new view of digital strategy that shifts the focus from "produce the best content" to "create the best connections." Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 14 Sep 2016
- Research & Ideas
Web Surfers Have a Schedule and Stick to It
Note to web marketers: Consumers won't carve out more time to visit your site. So how do you attract them? Start by understanding their online habits, reports new research by Shane Greenstein and colleagues. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 13 Jul 2016
- HBS Case
How Uber, Airbnb, and Etsy Attracted Their First 1,000 Customers
Thales Teixeira studies three of the most successful “platform” startups to understand the chicken-and-egg challenge of how companies can attract their first customers. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 20 Jun 2016
- Research & Ideas
When Predicting Other People's Preferences, You're Probably Wrong
Marketers, job hunters and people looking for mates are all called upon to predict behavior—and many are probably wrong. The reason: We erroneously make assumptions about what others will like and dislike based on their previous choices, according to new research by Kate Barasz, Tami Kim, and Leslie John. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 13 Apr 2016
- Research & Ideas
Why Your Company Wants to be a 'Cognitive Referent' (Hint: SpaceX)
Companies that come to epitomize a nascent market—think Starbucks and boutique coffee—can capture greater success than other startups, says Rory McDonald. Is there a roadmap to becoming a “cognitive referent”? Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 07 Apr 2016
- Working Paper Summaries
Strategic Channel Selection with Online Platforms: An Empirical Analysis of the Daily Deal Industry
Platform businesses grow by connecting groups of customers. This study sheds light on the relative bargaining power of platforms and merchants, demonstrating that price bargaining power is an important factor to consider in platform competition. When the platform is too big and powerful, its strong bargaining power may push away some business partners and hence slow down growth.
- 11 Mar 2016
- Working Paper Summaries
Becoming a Cognitive Referent: Market Creation and Cultural Strategy
Rory McDonald describes the making of a "cognitive referent," which is a firm that customers, the media, analysts, and employees automatically associate with a new market category--think Starbucks and coffee.
Op-Ed: It’s a Bad Idea to Ban Customers From Recording Videos
With videos of bad business practices routinely going viral, it might be tempting to prohibit customers from recording their surroundings. But banning cameras is the wrong way to go, says Benjamin Edelman. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.