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This study aims to investigate the impact of consumer ethnocentrism on consumers' evaluation of blockchain-based traceability information. It also examined how the use of quick response (QR) codes for traceability affects consumers' evaluation of traceable food products.

An online choice experiment was conducted to determine consumers' evaluation of the blockchain-based traceability of Feta cheese with a quota sample of 715 Greek consumers. Pearson bivariate correlation and mean comparison were used to examine the relationship between consumer ethnocentrism and QR use behaviour. Random parameter logit models were employed to examine consumers’ valuation of the examined attributes and interaction terms.

The results show that ethnocentric consumers are willing to pay more for blockchain-based traceability information. Ethnocentric consumers tend to scan QR codes with traceability information. Spending more time reading traceability information embedded in QR codes does not lead to a higher willingness-to-pay (WTP) for traceable food products.

The findings suggest that patriotic marketing messages can draw consumers' attention to blockchain-based traceability information. The modest WTP for and low familiarity with blockchain-based traceability systems raise the need for educating consumers regarding the benefits of blockchain in traceability systems.

This is the first study to provide timely empirical evidence of a positive WTP for blockchain-based traceability information for a processed dairy product. This study is the first to attempt to distinguish the effects of the intention to scan QR codes and reading information embedded in QR codes on consumers’ valuation of food attributes.

The proliferation of industry platforms has disrupted several industries. Firms adopting a platform business model have experienced a substantial expansion in size and scale, positioning themselves as the foremost valuable entities in market capitalization. Over the past two decades, there has been a substantial expansion in the body of literature dedicated to platforms, and different streams of research have emerged. Despite considerable efforts and the significant progress made in recent years toward a comprehensive understanding of industry platforms, there is still room for further harnessing the field’s diversity. As a result, the aim of this article is to examine the field’s structure, identify research concerns and provide suggestions for future research, thereby enhancing the overall understanding of industry platforms.

We conducted a thorough examination of 458 articles on the topic using bibliometric methods and systematic review techniques.

Through co-citation analysis, we identified five distinct clusters rooted in various bodies of literature: two-sided markets, industry platforms, digital platforms, innovation platforms and two-sided networks. Furthermore, the examination of these five clusters has revealed three key areas that demand further consideration: (1) terminologies, (2) classifications and (3) perspectives.

While previous reviews have provided valuable insights into the topic of industry platforms, none have explored the structure of the field so far. Consequently, as a first step toward advancing the field, we uncover the structure of the literature, identifying three major areas of concern. By addressing these concerns, our goal is to converge different clusters, thereby harnessing the diversity in the field and enhancing the overall understanding of industry platforms.

This chapter reviews new technologies, new types of players and new types of financial products that together are fundamentally affecting supply and demand dynamics in the financial sector and contributing to the emerging digital financial landscape. The aim of this chapter is to set a common understanding on the underlying forces of digital disruption in the financial sector before exploring the challenges to monetary and financial stability that are arising. In later chapters, the book will examine how central banks might deal with the challenges and help shape the emerging digital financial landscape.

This paper has a dual purpose. The first is to provide a thorough analysis of developments in international marketing in relation to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic; the second is to capitalize on these developments to set an agenda for future research in the field of international marketing.

This paper zooms in on and reviews the 18 papers published in International Marketing Review’s (IMR) Special Issue on “Covid 19: advancing international marketing theory and guiding practice” (2023, volume 40, issue 5). It also integrates recent research at the intersection of international marketing and the COVID-19 pandemic.

The paper highlights five areas that embody significant contemporaneous changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic and affect international marketing practice. These include (1) shifts in consumer behavior, (2) digitalization and artificial intelligence, (3) disruptions in supply chains, (4) communication and corporate social responsibility (CSR), and (5) international dynamic marketing capabilities. In order to advance international marketing theory in relation to pandemics and other external crises, the paper establishes research directions for each of these areas.

The paper provides a novel and comprehensive categorization of fundamental shifts caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and lays out a research roadmap to advance research in the field of International Marketing (IM). Important implications for practice are also discussed.

This study aims to investigate the integration of blockchain technology into the food supply chain within the restaurant industry. It focuses on how blockchain can be applied to enhance transparency and trust in tracking food sources, ultimately impacting customer satisfaction.

A service design workshop (Study 1) and three between-subjects experiments (Studies 2–4) were conducted.

Results indicate that blockchain adoption significantly improves traceability and trust in the food supply chain. This improvement in turn enhances customer satisfaction through perceived improvements in food safety, quality and naturalness. This study also notes that the effects of blockchain technology vary depending on the type of restaurant (casual or fine dining) and its location (tourist destinations or residential areas).

The findings offer practical insights for restaurant owners, technology developers and policymakers. Emphasizing the benefits of blockchain adoption, this study guides decision-making regarding technology investments for enhancing customer service and satisfaction in the hospitality sector.

This research contributes novel insights to the field of technology innovation in the hospitality industry. It extends the understanding of signaling theory by exploring how blockchain technology can serve as a tool for signal transmission in restaurant food supply chains.

A qualitative approach based on grounded theory was utilized, with data collected through 26 semi-structured interviews with social entrepreneurs. Alas’s Triangular Model provided the framework for data analysis and interpretation.

This study explores how Hong Kong social enterprises approached crisis and change management during the COVID-19 pandemic, examining their resilience-building strategies.

The pandemic triggered an existential crisis for many social enterprises, causing severe revenue losses. However, strong leadership and cultures based on social mission enabled resilience. Enterprises demonstrated agility by rapidly transitioning operations online and establishing partnerships. Technology adaptation and social innovation were pivotal to sustaining impact.

As the sample comprises enterprises that survived the pandemic, insights into failed enterprises are lacking. Comparative analysis could illuminate differences in crisis response between successful and unsuccessful cases.

The study’s practical implications suggest that social enterprises should focus on developing flexible crisis management plans, cultivating purposeful leadership, embracing digital transformation, strengthening collaborative networks and prioritizing organizational learning to effectively navigate crises while staying true to their social missions.

Findings demonstrate how shared values and cultures grounded in purpose can anchor organizations amidst upheaval, fostering resilience. This underscores the role of social enterprises in modeling responsiveness to societal needs.

While research has examined social enterprises’ vulnerability in crises, investigation into their crisis management practices is limited. This study enriches understanding of how social enterprises effectively navigate turbulence.

Social media celebrities are getting popular in promotions, and more people have experienced social media to receive information on diet and health tips. This research presents a study showing how social media can influence young people's diet behavior through collaboration with social media celebrities.

Through recruiting on various social media and online education forums, this research recruited 196 young Hongkongers to participate in an online survey developed based on the AIDA (Action, Interest, Desire, Attention) marketing communication model on how youths access diet information from social media celebrities in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong youths consume diet information from social media celebrities through instant messaging systems, social networking sites and online videos, and, in particular, information on food calories and nutrition. However, sponsorship from vendors would decrease their desire to agree with the messages from social media celebrities. After receiving this information, some participants would follow tips and guides from social media celebrities. However, they seldom share such information. Interestingly, males are more willing to follow these tips and guides.

First, this study fills the gap of prior research, which did not study much on how social media celebrities contribute to diet promotion to youths in Asia. Second, through the AIDA Model, this study shows how social media can affect the awareness and accessibility of diet information by young Hongkongers, followed by initiating their interest in this topic and retrieving more relevant information. Furthermore, the authors further understand their desire to follow and improve their behavior as promoted by social media influencers and how they practice such behavior. Based on these findings, health-related brands could consider using social media influencers helping to promote their products and services, and these brands could further use social media to secure customer engagement.

Compared to traditional (domestic) e-commerce consumers, cross-border electronic commerce (CBEC) consumers may face greater information asymmetry in the CBEC purchase process. Given this background, however, the literature has paid limited attention to the informational antecedents that influence consumers' perceptions of transaction costs and their CBEC purchase intentions. To fill this gap, this study integrates the elaboration likelihood model (ELM) and transaction cost theory (TCT) to develop a model for exploring how product (website informativeness, product diagnosticity and website interactivity as the central route) and external (country brand, website policy and vendor reputation as the peripheral route) informational antecedents affect consumers’ evaluations of transaction costs in terms of uncertainty and asset specificity and their CBEC purchase intentions.

This study employs a survey approach to validate the model with 766 Generation Z CBEC consumers based on judgment sampling. The partial least squares (PLS) technique is adopted for data analysis.

The results show that all the proposed central and peripheral informational antecedents reduce consumers’ perceptions of uncertainty and asset specificity, which in turn negatively influences their CBEC purchase intentions.

Through this investigation, this study increases our understanding of how product and external informational antecedents affect consumers’ evaluations of transaction costs, which subsequently determine their CBEC purchase decisions. This study offers theoretical contributions to existing CBEC research and has practical implications for CBEC organizations and managers.

We aim to explore how the COVID-19 crisis has initiated entrepreneurship amongst micro-scale businesses in the notably vulnerable street food industry. We highlight Malaysian street food vendors’ remarkable resilience as they evolved from informal enterprises into innovative entrepreneurs during the pandemic. This involves comprehending the pandemic’s impact and the coping strategies these businesses adopt to endure, evolve and thrive.

We carried out a semi-structured interview with 20 street food vendors in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. By using a qualitative approach and integrating theories on appraisal, resource management and self-regulated activities, this paper explores vendors’ experiences on their journey towards becoming entrepreneurs regardless of limited resources.

Despite the disruption, COVID-19 offers a crucial wake-up call even for micro-scale businesses. We discover the capability of street food vendors to outlast crisis through transformation into individuals with an entrepreneurial mindset. They adapted by diversifying their offerings and implementing new strategies like digital marketing and e-commerce. We also emphasise the contribution of family members in providing psychosocial support and navigating business challenges as an advantage of employing a highly self-efficacious individual within the group. This transformation not only ensures the survival of micro-scale enterprises but also underscores their potential to thrive and innovate, even in the face of adversity.

This paper extends the existing literature on street vending by integrating the appraisal theory of emotion, resource-based view theory and self-efficacy theory to explore how street food vendors with limited resources have managed to transform the informal business nature into an entrepreneurial environment under the pressure of a crisis.

In 2021, more than half a million Indian students traveled abroad to pursue Master’s programs. Against this background, we explore why Indian students do not enroll in Master’s programs in Indian higher education (IHE) institutions.

Semi-structured, in-depth online interviews of 30 Indian international students pursuing post-graduation studies in four major host countries were conducted to elicit the required information. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and analyzed using a thematic approach. The attribution theory was used as a theoretical lens to discuss the findings.

The results indicate that the primary reasons for students not choosing Indian institutions are wide-ranging. The need to study abroad, decision influencers and why they did not consider IHE institutes were three significant categories encompassing nine themes. The study revealed that besides other factors, the rigor of admission in premier Indian universities is much higher when compared with other international universities. Also, the perceived rate of return in investing in those developed countries' universities is better when compared with those of premier Indian universities.

The insights will act as marketing intelligence for supporting the business and university administrators of Indian universities in formulating effective tactics to admit more students from this in-demand Indian subgroup.

Most of the existing research papers discuss the motivation and challenges of Indian international students for studying abroad, There is negligible research on their demotivation to join IHE institutions. The present study tries to focus on the aspects that most of them considered but did not join IHE. Also, the attribution theory is a new perspective for understanding their behavior in selecting higher education institutions.