Search results

Assortment planning, the determination of the range of choices to be made available at a given time, is a primary merchandising function. Many people with different job titles in both apparel manufacturing and retailing make decisions that impact merchandise assortments. The purpose of this paper is to explain the concept of assortment diversity as measured by volume per stock‐keeping unit for an assortment (VSA), describe the relationship of VSA to per cent gross margin (%GM), and propose topics for further research.

A critical issue faced by retailers is determining the composition of the product assortment in every category and setting the price levels for each product without compromising category‐level customer demand or operational efficiency. The purpose of this paper is to propose a novel, model‐based clustering approach to bring parsimony to retailers' assortment configuration and pricing process. The objective of the model is to group alternative assortment configurations into sets to which the category exhibits equivalent vulnerability.

In this method, each possible assortment and pricing configuration is first conceptualized as a unified entity and then these entities are clustered based on the vulnerability of category level sales. The authors illustrate the benefits of this new method for category planning using two sets of data for brands of soft drinks and enhanced water, collected from a panel of adult customers.

The results from both data sets show that several assortment configurations, varying significantly in terms of numbers of products and prices, result in similar levels of category vulnerability. In other words, several widely‐different product‐pricing combinations result in similar levels of category demand.

The paper's findings imply that retailers can bring parsimony to their category management process by shifting their strategic focus from individual brands to assortment clusters. Specifically, they can select the most efficient or the smallest assortment from each cluster without sacrificing category demand. Overall, the authors' approach can help simplify the complex decision‐making process related to product selection and price setting, and help retailers achieve the dual objective of operational efficiency and high category demand.

Because increasing product variety in retail conflicts with limited shelf space, managing assortment and shelf quantities is a core decision in this sector. A retailer needs to define the assortment size and then assign shelf space to meet consumer demand. However, the current literature lacks not only information on the comprehensive structure of the decision problem, but also a decision support system that can be directly applied to practice in a straightforward manner. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The findings were developed and evaluated by means of explorative interviews with grocery retail experts. An optimization model is proposed to solve the problem of assortment planning with limited shelf space for data sets of a size relevant in real retail practice.

The author identifies the underlying planning problems based on a qualitative survey of retailers and relates the problems to each other. This paper develops a pragmatic approach to the capacitated assortment problem with stochastic demand and substitution effects. The numerical examples reveal that substitution demand has a significant impact on total profit and solution structure.

The author shows that the model and solution approach are scalable to problem sizes relevant in practice. Furthermore, the planning architecture structures the related planning questions and forms a foundation for further research on decision support systems.

The planning framework structures the associated decision problems in assortment planning. An efficient solution approach for assortment planning is proposed.

This paper aims to demonstrate how and why holistic thinking mitigates the negative impact of large assortments on satisfaction.

Five between-subject experiments demonstrate the mitigating role of holism on choice overload across a variety of contexts.

While large assortments create overload feeling, holistic thinking mitigates the negative impact of overload feeling on satisfaction for both chronic (Studies 1a and 1b) and decision-specific (Studies 1b and 1c) holistic thinkers, as well as those who adopt a more holistic thinking style because of the decision goal (Study 2) or incidental priming (Study 3).

This paper introduces a new moderator of choice overload effects – holistic thinking – and shows how it mitigates the negative indirect effect of assortment size on satisfaction. This paper contributes to the literature on assortment size effects and shows that even when assortment size increases overload feeling, this negative impact of assortment size can still be reduced.

Marketers with large assortments can reduce the negative impact of overload feeling and increase satisfaction by promoting the hedonic features of the products and encouraging holistic thinking. Similarly, consumers can reduce the negative impact of overload feeling by approaching their consumption more holistically either because of their individual traits or situational factors.

This research contributes a new moderator to the choice overload literature: holistic thinking. In doing so, it adopts a broader consideration of the decision-making process underlying overload effects and pinpoints how (i.e. by which path) holistic thinking mitigates the negative impact of large assortments.

The paper presents how a European pick‐and‐mix confectionery company has employed a new forecasting approach – assortment forecasting – to reduce significantly time spent on forecasting by working with an entire assortment at a time instead of producing a forecast for each product individually. The implementation of a less time‐consuming forecasting method has enabled the company to involve its salespeople in forecasting and in this way gain access to their product and market knowledge. The case company's implementation of the new forecasting method is described and its forecasting accuracy and time spent on forecasting before and after the implementation are measured. The results demonstrate a remarkable increase in forecasting efficiency as well as improved communication within the company.

This research shows that to reach their prime goal of building an efficient assortment, retailers need, beside increasing the outlet’s cost‐efficiency, to evaluate shoppers’ assortment perceptions so that what the store actually offers can be tailored to meet customers’ needs and expectations. Our findings reveal that consumers’ perceptions of the assortment range stems from the combination of few indicators, mainly the number of stock‐keeping units proposed and the availability of the favorite brands. Also demonstrates that consumers evaluation of the overall store assortment draws on the perceived choice within the product categories where they are highly sensitive to the assortment range.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the joint effects of menu pages (single page vs multiple pages) and assortment organization (benefit- vs attribute-based) on consumers’ perceptions of variety with large assortments.

A 2 (assortment structure: single page vs multiple pages)×2 (assortment organization: benefit- vs attribute-based) experimental between-subjects design was used to test the hypotheses.

The results suggest that with a one-page tea menu, participants perceived greater variety with the attribute-based (e.g. black teas, herbal teas, green teas, and oolong teas) menu than with the (e.g. energy-boosting, stress-relief, weight loss, and immune system-improvement) benefit-based menu. Conversely, when the menu was displayed on four pages, participants showed similar perceptions of variety across the two menu types.

In some contexts, 20 menu items may not be considered a large assortment. Also, the authors did not test consumers’ preexisting preferences.

When food service operators offer an extensive benefit-based menu, it is advisable to place the options over multiple pages. If the menu needs to be displayed on a single spatial unit (e.g. a black board, or applications on a tablet or smartphone), practitioners should organize the menu based on attributes rather than benefits.

Although the demand for healthy dining options has led many foodservice operators to apply benefit-based organization to items on their menus, for example, by using terms such as “energy-boosting,” “stress-relief,” “weight-loss,” and “immune system-improvement,” little is known about the effectiveness of such a strategy.

The aim of this paper is to seek to understand better how consumers judge multiattribute products that are perceived as either more or less complete in terms of feature coverage in a category. Complete products are used to reduce the need of developing and managing expansive and expensive line‐extension portfolios.

The research used an experimental method and conducted two studies to test hypotheses derived from the marketing literature.

It is found that more complete multiattribute products are preferred to less complete alternatives. This preference for more complete products remains under larger competitive product assortment, but is reduced under smaller assortment. With a higher price level and larger assortment, the preference is substantial. However, under the conditions of lower price level/larger assortment, higher price level/smaller assortment, and lower price level/smaller assortment, the preference is again reduced.

More positive evaluations and higher product utility accrue from adding new features to multiattribute products prior to purchase. Moreover, more complete information causes more positive evaluations and cognitive responses. Larger assortment strains cognitive resources, and more complete multiattribute products are easier to understand than less complete multiattribute products. This processing facilitation generates positive affect leads to greater use of information that can shorten processing.

Brand managers can have a better understanding of how consumers judge more and less complete products, and under which circumstances more complete products are preferred.

The study of perceived product completeness is novel.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate consumers’ variety perception for online grocery assortments and, more generally, to better understand consumers’ attitude toward digital assortments. In particular, this research examines the influence of the organization of products that results from assortment structure and display.

Starting from the observation that previous work on traditional assortments is not sufficient to understand consumers’ perceptions and attitudes, the paper adopts a hypothetico-deductive approach and develops four hypotheses. These hypotheses are tested using an experimental approach.

This research enables us to see that both attitude and variety perception are affected by the way products are organized on a website. Furthermore, contrary to what the literature on traditional assortments allows one to assume, the assortment corresponding to a more positive attitude is not perceived as being the more varied. As a result, our findings reconsider the link between variety perception and consumer assortment evaluation for digital assortments.

The work is based on data collected for only one product category. It would be interesting to explore other categories also, to determine if the structure of the assortment and variety perception have stable effects.

The results inform retailers that they must carefully design the display of their digital assortments. If a retailer wants to enhance variety perception, the authors recommend using an assortment organized by brand, or presenting all the products together. If, instead, the goal is to encourage a positive attitude, the retailer should opt for assortments sorted by attribute or that present all products together.

This research adopts a new orientation on assortment perception and evaluation, considering the specificities involved in digitizing assortments. In addition, this research studies a real product category and puts respondents in experimental conditions close to reality.

The aim of this study is to better understand how consumers understand and judge multi‐attribute products that are perceived as either more or less complete in terms of feature coverage in a category. Complete products are used to reduce the need of developing and managing expansive and expensive line‐extension portfolios.

The authors used an experimental method and conducted two studies to test hypotheses derived from the marketing literature.

The authors find more complete multi‐attribute products are preferred to less complete alternatives. This preference for more complete products remains under larger competitive product assortment, but is reduced under smaller assortment. With a higher price level and larger assortment, the preference is substantial. However, under the conditions of lower price level/larger assortment, higher price level/smaller assortment, and lower price level/smaller assortment, the preference is again reduced.

More positive evaluations and higher product utility accrue from adding new features to multi‐attribute products prior to purchase. Moreover, more complete information causes more positive evaluations and cognitive responses. Larger assortment strains cognitive resources, and more complete multi‐attribute products are easier to understand than less complete multi‐attribute products. This processing facilitation generates positive affect and leads to greater use of information that can shorten processing. Price level strongly influences processing of more complete products under larger assortment, but not under smaller assortment.

Brand managers have a better understanding of how consumers judge more and less complete products, and under which circumstances more complete products are preferred.

The study of perceived product completeness is novel.