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This paper explores the conditions in which logistics service providers (LSPs) can compete or collaborate with banks in offering inventory financing as a supply chain finance (SCF) service.

A multiple case study research methodology was adopted. The case study involved six LSPs across Europe. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews.

The results highlighted that an attractive credit demand for LSPs consists in suppliers with high amounts of inventory or borrowing needs that go beyond their borrowing capacity from the perspective of a bank. LSPs can respond to this demand when they have three specific capabilities as follows: risk assessment, risk monitoring and organizational capabilities. The offer of inventory financing can be controlled by the LSPs or by the banks. When the LSPs control the offer, they offer different conditions compared to the banks in terms of credit rationing, transaction costs, payment flexibility, tax rate advantage and financial risk management. When the banks control the offer, the LSPs influence the nature of the SCF services only in terms of credit rationing and transaction costs. The LSPs seem to easily develop risk assessment and risk mitigation capabilities, while the organisational capabilities appear to be the most challenging to build, and when absent they create a barrier to the provision of inventory financing.

The value of the paper is twofold. First, the paper provides a comprehensive taxonomy of the factors conditioning the role of the LSPs in the provision of inventory financing as a SCF service. Second, the paper clarifies the link between the factors and the different roles played by the LSPs.

Although manufacturers have traditionally viewed reverse supply chain (RSC) activities as a costly nuisance, more recent research has found that the RSC can contribute to the firm’s financial performance. The purpose of this paper is to identify how the RSC can contribute to the firm’s financial performance and examine the exogenous contingency factors decisive for the contribution’s size. Because the exogenous factors are outside the control of the firm’s operations and supply chain management, the factors influence the RSC’s financial contribution irrespective of managerial policies and design decisions.

The paper applies a systematic literature review using the sequence of planning the review, searching and screening literature, extracting information from the selected literature, and synthesizing and analyzing findings. In total, 112 papers were included.

The study has identified 15 distinct opportunities for RSC-contribution to the firm’s financial performance. The study has identified 56 contingency factors. These are related to market segmentation, customer behavior, product design, and the firm’s distributor network. The study includes an interrelationship network between factors and the RSC’s contribution.

For managers, the paper shows how the RSC can increase the firm’s financial performance and which contingency factors determine whether operating a RSC will be financially viable if implemented.

While extant literature includes several reviews about RSC-related managerial policies and design decisions, this paper contains the very first collection of RSC-contribution opportunities available to manufacturers as well as the first review of exogenous contingency factors.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the applicability and utility of supply chain (SC) segmentation through demand profiling to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of infrastructure projects by identifying different types of project demand profiles.

A three-stage abductive research design was adopted. Stage 1 explored the applicability of SC segmentation, through demand profiling, to the portfolio of infrastructure projects in a utility company. Stage 2 was an iterative process of “theory matching”, to the portfolio, programme and project management literature. In stage 3, theoretical saturation was reached and “theory suggestions” were made through four propositions.

Four propositions outline how SC segmentation through project demand profiling could improve the effectiveness and efficiency of infrastructure projects. P1: the ability to recognise the different demand profiles of individual projects, and groups thereof, is a portfolio management necessity. P2: projects that contribute to the strategic upgrade of a capital asset should be considered a potential programme of inter-related repeatable projects whose delivery would benefit from economies of repetition. P3: the greater the ability to identify different demand profiles of individual/groups of projects, the greater the delivery efficiency. P4: economies of repetition developed through efficient delivery of programmes of repeatable projects can foster greater efficiency in the delivery of innovative projects through economies of recombination.

This work fills a gap in the portfolio management literature, suggesting that the initial screening, selection and prioritisation of project proposals should be expanded to recognise not only the project type, but also each project’s demand profile.

The purpose of this research is to develop empirically grounded propositions for further research into UK manufacturing productivity.

Interviews were conducted with managers from strategic, tactical and operational levels from four manufacturing sectors to produce case studies. A modified strategic alignment theory framework was used to code, compare and contrast narratives on perceived productivity antecedents, definitions, compatibility with the definition from the UK Office for National Statistics, and vertical alignment issues within and across cases.

It was found that different key antecedents can facilitate and/or prevent strategic vertical alignment. Discussion reveals complex nuances in perceptions of manufacturing productivity and using the modified strategic alignment theory/productivity antecedent framework.

In revealing the alignment or otherwise of productivity definitions at different levels within the firm, the paper reveals nine propositions for future research including definitions, skills, metrics, performance measurement systems, people and system-centric perspectives, the value-added perspective of productivity and the role of innovation.

The first problem is to assemble the works of Pucci; for there is no complete edition. His writings, some still unpublished, are scattered in a large number of manuscripts and these contain many variants, resulting from the popular nature of his verse, for much of it was meant to be recited in the streets and squares of his native town and in the oral tradition it has been considerably changed and modified. The Pucci manuscripts, with the exception of four (one in the Bibliothèque Nationale and three in the Bodleian), are to be found in various libraries in Italy, and editors and compilers of anthologies have taken material from them—a bit here and a bit there—in a haphazard way, printing what suited their purpose and often consulting only one of many manuscripts. Consequently there are different versions of some poems and few are edited critically, though the publication last year of Professor Sapegno's anthology Poeti minori del trecento with its 117 pages devoted to Pucci has remedied this state of affairs for some of the most important. The only collection of Pucci's verse—if we discount a group of sonnets and a sonnet sequence, both published by A. D'Ancona—is that of F. Ferri in La poesia popolare in A. Pucci (1909), and this is a very incomplete and uncritical work; but as it includes many poems not found elsewhere, it is essential for reference. Pucci's work in print must therefore be sought in many places: in F. Ferri (op. cit.), in anthologies, in periodicals, in editions of single or of two or three poems, and in many rare publications—often per nozze and therefore particularly difficult to come by, because of the few copies printed.

The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of information on origin, “typicalness”, production method and flavour on the willingness to pay and the sensorial appreciation of Tuscan sanguinaccio (Italian Salami).

The goal of the study was to explore how differences between willingness to pay and sensorial appreciation (measured using a hedonic score) for the three types are influenced by the nature of the sensorial and non-sensorial information available to the consumer. To evaluate reaction to sensorial information, typical information regimes used in works on degree of disconfirmation (Schifferstein, 2001) were adopted, that is, visual examination of the product with indication of the name and tasting of the labelled product.

Analysis of the results of the experiments indicates that Mallegato and Biroldo have particular characteristics that make it critical to promote them to a vast public. The information on the production methods and ingredients seemed to interact negatively with the sensorial perception of the product after tasting, probably because of the presence of blood and other problematic components (for example, components of the pig head in Biroldo) among the ingredients.

Limited size of the sample and a gastronomic niche product analyzed.

The negative influence of the processed information has to be considered to efficiently communicate the typicalness of these salami products. In fact, whilst for other traditional products, different kinds of information related to process, raw materials, recipes and, more generally, tradition can be jointly used to increase the arousal and the expectation on products quality characteristics, in this case, the communication strategy has to carefully consider the limit of these product components.

For the first time the use of experimental auctions investigate the role of problematic information, such as the presence of blood, on consumers’ preference towards a typical gastronomic product.