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The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of physical environment design (PED) and its antecedents on consumers’ emotional well-being (EWB). Drawing on place identity and emotional theories, the study aims to provide a new perspective to retail store experiences.

A survey of 800 respondents was conducted in London, out of which 764 responses were constructively used. The data was collected from international retail outlets, and structural equation modelling was used to analyse the data.

The empirical results show that PED has a positive effect on consumers’ EWB. Among the antecedents, visual identity does not have any significant effect on PED and EWB. In contrast, communication had a significant effect on PED but did not have any effect on EWB, and further, cultural heritage had a positive effect on both PED and EWB. Further, moderator analysis identifies the boundary conditions under which specific theories hold.

The value of this paper lies in its potential to be used for creating the perfect design planning in retail stores. Significant implications for managers and researchers are highlighted.

This paper presents an innovative approach to develop the principles of retail store’s PED to support the EWB of consumers.

Drawing upon the conservation of resources theory, this study aims to investigate whether, how and when salespeople’s substantive attribution of the organization’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) affects value-based selling (VBS). The authors argue that salespeople’s substantive CSR attribution increase value-based selling through two mechanisms (i.e. by lowering emotional exhaustion and increasing empathy), and treatment by customers can increase or decrease the strength of these relationships.

B2B salespeople working in various industries in China were recruited through snowball sampling to participate in the study. There were 462 volunteers (57.58% women; aged 30–55; tenure ranging from six months to 15 years) who provided valid self-report questionnaires.

Hierarchical multiple regression supported the association between salespeople’s substantive CSR attribution and VBS. The results showed that salespeople’s emotional state (i.e. emotional exhaustion and empathy) mediated the association between substantive CSR attribution and VBS. As expected, salespeople’s experiences of customer incivility weakened the mediating effect of emotional exhaustion; contrary to expectations, customer-initiated interpersonal justice weakened the mediation effect of empathy.

This study makes a unique contribution to the existing marketing literature by first investigating the role of salespeople’s attribution of CSR motives in facilitating their VBS, which answers the call to identify factors that predict VBS. In addition, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the authors are the first to test salespeople’s emotions as a mechanism of the link between their CSR attributions and selling behaviors.

As research emerged in terms of how narcissism, a negative or dark trait, has been found to be constructive in enhancing entrepreneurial behaviour, there are mixed results regarding the significance of narcissism in the field of entrepreneurship. Additionally, this previous research has mostly been conducted on student or nascent entrepreneur samples within developed economies. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to explore how narcissistic traits of established entrepreneurs in an emerging economy context infuence their entrepreneurial behaviour both positively and negatively.

Gioia methodology was applied in the qualitative study by means of in-depth interviews, which allowed for the unpacking of narcissistic traits among established entrepreneurs in South Africa. Four themes emerged from the data, and included insights related to entrepreneurial experience influencing behaviour; business growth linked to personal development; opportunity identification versus loss; and identity separation in relation to authentic identity versus an entrepreneurial identity.

The findings of the paper contribute to creating an understanding of how to hone individual narcissistic traits for positive influences that develop entrepreneurs while also contributing to their business development, opportunity realization and identity. In addition, the findings highlighted a separation between established entrepreneurs’ authentic personality and the inputs that end up resulting in the entrepreneurial personality.

This paper highlights the possibility of narcissism functioning as a business process involved in entrepreneurship rather than a necessary personality trait. An interesting dynamic contributed to what seems to be a constant battle between the authentic identity and the entrepreneur identity, gaining deeper insight surrounding established entrepreneurs’ experiences to survive and, more importantly, thrive as entrepreneurs.

This paper aims to identify and report the differential effects of activity control and capability control on role stressors, which subsequently affect salespeople’s job satisfaction and sales performance.

Drawing on job demands-resources (JD-R) theory, the authors defined active control and customer demandingness as the job demands and capability control as the job resource, and designed their relationship with role stressors, which are indicated as role ambiguity, role conflict and role overload. The authors enrolled a sample of 223 industrial salespeople from pharmaceutical companies. After collecting the data, the authors used structural equation modeling using AMOS to test and estimate causal relationships along with a two-step approach to examine the interaction effect. The authors have also tested the simple slope of two-way interactions. All of the measured variables were identical to those used in previous studies.

The study findings indicate that behavior-based control can be counterproductive. Reducing activity control can decrease role stress, increase job satisfaction and improve job performance; increasing capability control, however, can reduce role stress and increase job satisfaction and performance. It is also important to acknowledge the external environment of the sales context in which behavior-based control is most effective: whereas high customer demandingness and capability control are related to reduced role stress, high customer demandingness and activity control are related to increased role stress.

Sales managers should recognize that different control management regimes reinforce or mitigate salespeople’s job stressors and outcomes under specific conditions (i.e. work environments marked by higher or lower customer demandingness).

Drawing on JD-R theory, the research shows that a behavior control (i.e. activity control and capability control) has differential, and even opposite, psychological consequences.

Given the scarcity of studies regarding religious food as a destination attraction and limited research on tourist halal food experience, this study aims to explore and compare halal food experience perceived by Muslim and non-Muslim tourists in a non-Islamic destination.

This study was carried out in a halal food street in Yuanjia Village, China. It used a qualitative approach and interviewed 16 Muslim tourists and 20 non-Muslim tourists.

Six themes and 18 attributes of halal food experience were identified. The findings revealed that Muslim tourists saw the reassuring options and religious value of halal food as important experiences. By contrast, the experiences of abundant choices, value for money, sensory pleasure and unique charm were frequently mentioned by non-Muslim tourists. The nature of halal food, the context of China (i.e. Chinese halal food culture) and the feature of research site (i.e. food operation of Yuanjia Village) work together to create such experiences.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the first studies to explore and compare halal food experiences of Muslim and non-Muslim tourists in a non-Islamic country (China). This study suggests that halal food could be an appealing destination attraction, even in non-Islamic destinations. Thus, this study contributes to a better understanding of the halal food experiences and assists destination marketers in promoting halal food.

This study aims to examine the association between chief executive officers’ (CEOs) characteristics and sell-side analysts’ recommendations.

This study uses a sample of firms listed on the London Stock Exchange and uses two databases, Capital IQ and BoardEx to study the above relationship. A variety of regression analyses are used in the empirical models, including ordinary least squares, fixed effect, random effect, Tobit, Logit and generalized method of moments.

The authors find that firms with CEOs who had a wider network size and firms with foreign CEOs receive favorable investment recommendations. Further, firms with CEOs who have more time to retire are more likely to receive favorable investment recommendations. However, the authors find that firms with CEOs with more qualifications receive unfavorable recommendations and female CEOs are not affecting investment recommendations.

Ultimately, this study demonstrates the importance of CEO characteristics for sell-side analysts who play an important role in the stock markets.

This study aims to examine the applicability of Hartmann et al.’s (2018) service ecosystem framework to the day-to-day management of the modern sales force. The authors provide a review of the framework, acknowledging its strengths, while also indicating areas for advancement. The authors conclude with recommendations to the framework and indicate opportunities where future research could advance sales theory.

A review of the theoretical underpinnings of the service ecosystem framework is weighed against the established roles and responsibilities of the modern sales force in the literature.

The ability of the framework to capture the multi-level, multi-actor and dynamic aspects of sales represents an improvement in the conceptualization of selling is critical. Suggestions around the refinement for meso-level sales interactions and a more pliant application of service dominant-logic are offered.

The suggested extensions of the framework continue the advancement of novel theorization for the field of sales. Priorities for future research include consideration of ethical implications of the framework and formulations of new management strategies reflective of the broad and dynamic properties of the ecosystem conceptualization.

This paper provides managerial guidelines and implications tied specifically to the thick and thin crossing points and how they may impact employee decision-making.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to pointedly examine the service ecosystem framework with respect to established principles of managing a modern sales force.

The authors assess the development potential of cowpea beyond grain in local markets in Mali by: (1) identifying trader types and types of cowpea products sold; (2) examining trader roles; (3) estimating gross margins and their determinants; and (4) discussing policy opportunities to further develop the value chain.

The authors analyze data collected through observation and semi-structured questionnaires from 487 sellers in 26 markets, including market, seller, and product characteristics. The authors also calculate gross margins and conduct a regression analysis to identify influential factors.

The authors identify several types of cowpea sellers in local markets, including processor-retailers, retailers of fresh leaves and fodder, and grain retailers, collectors and wholesalers. Women dominate the marketing of processed products and fresh leaves. The marketing of boiled cowpeas offers retailers higher margin rates compared to fritters and pancakes. Grain sellers, who are mostly men, have lower margins but sell larger quantities. Processor-retailers bring more value to the cowpea value chain. Specialization of the seller in cowpea, regional location of the market and day of the market fair all influence gross margins.

Future work should explore consumer preferences for different types of cowpea products.

This study of the cowpea value chain in Mali has revealed the multidimensional character of the cowpea plant, which goes far beyond its grain and highlight the important roles played by women.

The main goal of this paper is to study empirically the importance of experience of top managers and firms for export performance, having controlled for a number of firm characteristics.

The study is based on the probit model applied to the 2020 edition of the BEEPS firm level survey. The authors analyze firms in 15 EU member and 15 non-member countries.

The results indicate that firm experience can increase the probability of direct exporting, but is not significant for indirect exporting. The results also support the importance of interaction between experience of managers and experience of firms. The authors conclude that only the combination of managerial and firm experience can have a positive and significant effect for direct exporting. This relationship is more pronounced in the case of EU members.

The main limitations of our approach are related to data constraints. These include availability of only cross-sectional data and the limited number of individual characteristics of managers.

The importance of experience for exporting suggests that firms can break into foreign markets by hiring more experienced managers.

Post-communist countries can improve their export performance by hiring more experienced managers that would stimulate direct exports. Moreover, they can also export indirectly through intermediaries.

In contrast to previous studies, the authors used a model proposed by Jørgensen and Schroder (2008) in which the authors endogenized the costs of exporting by linking them to firm and managerial experience. Then, the authors validated empirically the importance of experience for firm export performance, having controlled for the set of individual firm characteristics.

Non-profit organizations (NPOs) are exposed to a highly competitive environment in which they are forced to grow their commercial activity to acquire additional financial resources. This study aims to create an understanding of how NPOs involved in textile reuse as a revenue-generating programme manage their reverse supply chains (RSC).

The research involves an embedded single-case study of NPOs in Finland involved in post-use textile collection. The main data sources are semi-structured interviews and participant observations.

This study is inspired by the microfoundations movement and identifies the underlying microfoundations of the NPOs’ capabilities for managing RSC for textile reuse. The study contributes to the literature by demonstrating NPOs’ lower-level, granular practices and their adaptations for achieving quality outcomes in textile reuse.

The findings have context sensitivity and apply to the NPOs which operate in a context similar to Finland, such as in other Nordic countries.

This study continues the discussion on the adoption of “business-like” practices in the NPOs’ pursuit of additional revenue streams to finance humanitarian work. The findings of this study can also be transferred to the growing area of domestic textile circularity.

Using the case of NPOs in textile reuse, the study illustrates how RSC management can serve a social, non-profit cause and transform unwanted textile products into a source of fundraising for humanitarian work.

This enriches the understanding of NPOs’ practices within the scope of revenue-generating programmes by examining one of them – textile reuse through charity shops from an RSC perspective.