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The purpose of this paper is to provide an exploratory examination of urban retail marketing and management strategies employed in six US cities with reputations for having central business districts (CBD) that are either flourishing or developing. It also investigates the roles played by urban retailers in working with CBD revitalization efforts.

Depth interviews were conducted with economic development managers and urban retailer owners/managers from each CBD. Content analysis, preceded by a comprehensive review of academic and trade literature, was used to identify key concepts. An iterative coding process resulted in identifying broad strategic themes and related strategies.

Strategies were classified into three urban retailing and five economic revitalization themes. These strategies varied depending on whether cities had flourishing or developing CBDs.

The study provided a systematic and comprehensive examination of strategies that may guide theory development and provide practical information on CBD redevelopment. Potential bias in results should be considered when evaluating results due to the use of qualitative methods and convenience sampling.

Information concerning similarities in the redevelopment efforts of six comparable US cities is provided.

This empirical study aims to examine luxury fashion retailers' localised multiple channel distribution strategies in China.

Through case studies of 15 participating retailers, qualitative data were collected from 33 semi-structured interviews.

Strong impacts of internationalisation strategies, distribution strategies and channel length towards multiple channel retailing are revealed. Multi-channel retailing is widely employed by firms who have entered China and further developed their businesses through local partnerships and adopted a selective distribution strategy via relatively longer channels. Omni-channel retailing is only suitable for the few retailers using an exclusive distribution strategy through direct marketing and wholly owned customer relationship management. As a dynamic transformation from multi- to omni-channel retailing, cross-channel retailing is adopted by those who are withdrawing from local partnerships and shifting to wholly owned expansions and operations in host markets.

The results are potentially challenged by relatively small sample size.

Practitioners are suggested to adapt multiple channel retailing to their international expansion strategies, distribution strategies and channel length in the host markets.

This paper contributes to the literature in both multiple channel retailing and international retailing by offering insights into the motives, development patterns and suitability of multiple channel retailing in the international retail marketing context.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impacts of the business environment on operations strategy encompassed by competitive priorities in China's retail sector.

This is a case study of a multinational retailer to understand how the company develops appropriate operations strategies to survive in the competitive and dynamic Chinese business environment.

The study identifies that companies intending to expand their businesses in emerging markets face many challenges in the new business environment, and that various dimensions of the business environment (e.g. business cost, competitive hostility, and environmental dynamism) affect the development of retail operations strategy. The strategy of flexibility is particularly important for international companies to survive in an increasingly dynamic and competitive environment. Foreign retailers need to be flexible and agile, adapting to the Chinese market environment in many ways in order to succeed.

This study seems to be the first in investigating the effects of the business environment on international operations strategy in the service (retail) sector, especially in the Chinese context.

As manufacturers and retailers aim to increase return on marketing investments, value- vs experience-related trade promotions gain attention. These two trade promotions become complicated in the presence of different retail format strategies (generalist vs specialist) and channel structures (direct to retailer vs distributors). Building on trade promotion literature, this study aims to show the main effect of value-related and experience-related trade promotions on retailers’ sales and the moderating role of different retail strategies and channel structures.

The authors use unique panel data from 8 personal care brands with 1,920 observations to test the hypotheses. The authors investigate how consumer goods manufacturer sells products using different channels structures and retail strategies. Estimated panel regressions provide the empirical evidence and robustness analyzes provide extra confidence to the findings.

Results reveal higher retail sales when the manufacturer invests in value-related trade promotions rather than experience-related trade promotions. The results also demonstrate how the manufacturer successfully invests in trade promotion by adequately accounting for channel structure and retail strategy. While temporary price reduction’s positive effect on retail sales is enhanced in generalist retailers (e.g. supermarket stores), shelf display’s positive impact is enhanced in specialist retailers (drug stores).

The authors used unique panel data accounting for 15 months, limiting the findings. The results supported the investment allocation decisions in each period. However, future research may evaluate the effectiveness over a longer period and thoroughly address each investment’s seasonal effects.

The authors unveil how retailers achieve higher sales with value-related trade promotions when compared to experience-related trade promotions. The authors also shed light on the way manufacturers design their relationships with generalist and specialist retailers by working in direct and indirect channels. Trade promotions yield better results when the direct channel structure couples with a retailer’s generalist strategy.

The empirical findings help manufacturers achieve success in trade promotions by developing an equitable evaluation to contrast value- and experience-related promotions accounting for generalist and specialist retail strategies and direct and indirect channels.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate employment of positioning strategies in the retail bank sector of Sub-Saharan Africa, specifically using Ghana as the study context. In addition, it explores the applicability of western-based typology of positioning strategies in the Sub-Saharan African environment.

Six retail banks – three national and three foreign – are studied, each through an in-depth case study method: covert and participant observation techniques; and face-to-face interviews of chief executive officers, marketing managers, and bank branch managers provided data for the study.

The results show that the “service” positioning strategy is the most popular strategy employed by retail banks. “Value for money,” “attractiveness,” “brand name,” and “country of origin” positioning strategies are also dominant. “Top of the range” and “selectivity” strategies are minimally pursued by the sample of banks studied. The results reveal that both foreign and national retail banks employ multiple positioning strategies in the face of competition. However, foreign retail banks consistently employ a; large number of strategies relative to national retail banks. This paper supports the applicability of a western-derived set of positioning strategies in the Sub-Saharan African marketplace.

This study closes a gap in the understanding of positioning, as well as filling the empirical gap in the application of positioning. In addition, it helps resolve a contextual gap of knowledge in Sub-Saharan Africa’s retail banking sector.

This study responds to Porter (1996), Clancy and Trout (2002), and Knox (2004) for continued empirical research in positioning in service industries and specifically in Sub-Saharan African economies (Coffie, 2014, 2016; Coffie and Owusu-Frimpong, 2014). Moreover, this research adds value to the banking and marketing literatures through a qualitative case study method, which is an important yet overlooked research method (Yin, 2009).

The purpose of this paper is to use the game theory combined with Monte Carlo simulation modelling to support the analysis of different retail marketing strategies, in particular, using payoff matrices for modelling the likely outcomes from different retail marketing strategies.

Theoretical research was utilised to develop a practical approach for applying game theory to retail marketing strategies via payoff matrices combined with Monte Carlo simulation modelling.

Game theory combined with Monte Carlo simulation modelling can provide a formal approach to understanding consumer decision making in a retail environment, which can support the development of retail marketing strategies.

Game theory combined with Monte Carlo simulation modelling can support the modelling of the interaction between retail marketing actions and consumer responses in a practical formal probabilistic manner, which can inform marketing strategies used by retail companies in a practical manner.

Game theory combined with Monte Carlo simulation modelling can provide a formalised mechanism for examining how consumers may respond to different retail marketing strategies.

The originality of this research is the practical application of game theory to retail marketing, in particular the use of payoff matrices combined with Monte Carlo simulation modelling to examine likely consumer behaviour in response to different retail marketing approaches.

The paper investigates firms' optimal pricing policies and green strategies in a dynamic green supply chain with consideration of different retail service strategies. The purpose of the paper is to address the following research questions: (1) What are the optimal pricing policies and green strategies of the dynamic decentralized supply chain with the competitive or supportive retail service? (2) How does the dynamic consumer's perception of green product affect these equilibrium solutions?

The paper establishes the dynamic game models and then derives a firm's instantaneous and steady-state feedback equilibrium solutions in three scenarios as follows: (1) the integrated supply chain; (2) the decentralized supply chain with competitive retail service and (3) the decentralized supply chain with supportive retail service. Finally, we conduct numerical analyses to compare the firm's instantaneous and steady-state equilibrium solutions and profit in the three scenarios.

The theoretical and numerical analysis results suggest that the supportive retail service is less inefficient than the competitive retail service in the decentralized supply chain and that the types of retail service have no influence on the green strategy. Moreover, a firm's myopia leads to lowering the greenness degree, retail service level and severe price competition, resulting in economic losses. Consumers’ initial perception of greenness degree determines whether the retailer should adopt the skimming pricing strategy or penetration pricing strategy. Furthermore, only when consumers’ perception of greenness degree is higher than a threshold, will the manufacturer produce green product with positive greenness degree.

This is one of few studies on the effect of different types of retail service on horizontal competition in green supply chain. The extension of the static study by adopting differential game approaches provides researchers with a deeper understanding of the application of retail service in green supply chain.

The evolution of private labels (PL) is a recent trend in the retail industry: many retailers now manage a PL portfolio that includes multiple value propositions, as well as various brand name strategies. Little research has been done, however, on how this combination of PL strategies conditions the results of the retailer that manages them. This study aims to examine the formation of PL brand equity and its effect on store loyalty for retailers with differently tiered PL programs (a “better” program with standard PL vs a full PL quality spectrum with economy, standard and premium PLs) and different PL naming strategies (store-banner name or stand-alone brand name).

A survey (N = 644) was used to test the model in the context of the consumer goods retail industry. Exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and multi-group structural equation modelling techniques were used to assess the proposed model.

The results show differences in the formation of PL loyalty based on whether the retailer has a tiered PL program. In portfolios with economy, standard and premium PLs, PL associations have a stronger effect than PL awareness in the formation of PL loyalty. Portfolios with a standard PL show balanced effects of PL associations and PL awareness on PL loyalty formation. As to the positive effect of PL brand equity on store loyalty, this study also shows a stronger effect of PL brand equity on store loyalty in chains that choose to use their store banner name in their PLs.

Retailers that manage multi-tier PL portfolios (as opposed to those that commercialise a standard PL) can increase loyalty to the PL portfolio significantly by constructing highly differentiated images of their economy, standard and premium PLs to ensure that consumers truly perceive the different value propositions of their PL tiers. As to PL naming strategy, the authors recommend that retailers that use the same retail chain name for one or several of their PLs invest in their corporate reputation to strengthen the brand equity achieved by their PLs and thus increase loyalty to the retail chain. Retailers must perform specific communication and advertising campaigns for PLs with the stand-alone brand name.

Today, any reference to PLs as a whole is overly simplistic, but no research has assessed empirically differences in the influences of a multi-tiered vs a standard PL program on the PL loyalty formation for PL portfolios. Nor has any empirical research incorporated the influence of PL naming strategy on store loyalty. This study fills these gaps, integrating into the same model two significant moderating variables of retailers’ strategy: their PL tier strategy and their PL naming strategy.

Many e-commerce firms suffer from high returns because of inaccurate and incomplete product information. Omnichannel and bundling settings can help firms improve operational efficiency and lower returns costs. However, no studies have been conducted on omnichannel supply chains considering bundling strategies. The purpose of this study is to examine the comparison between test-in-store-and-buy-online (TSBO) and online retail, comparing manufacturers’ bundling with retailers’ bundling.

The supply chain discussed here consists of two competitive manufacturers and one retailer. The retailer sells both manufacturers' products online and displays one manufacturer's product in a showroom who bears the display cost. Stackelberg game theory is used to develop mathematical models that help manufacturers and retailers make the most effective decisions. Here, the manufacturer is the Stackelberg leader, while the retailer is the follower. Using the backward induction approach, the authors determined the optimal values for selling price, wholesale price and service effort level.

The results show that the total TSBO retailing profit under manufacturer bundling is highest when the second manufacturer integrates with the online retailer. The result additionally establishes that when the bundling cost exceeds a certain threshold (1.5), the total profit is higher for the non-integrated type of supply chain channel as compared to the integrated retailer bundling-based configuration.

The operations and logistics manager will likely undertake the TSBO omnichannel strategy during manufacturers bundling and retailer bundling under the integrated strategy.

The main contribution of the study is to examine the effect of TSBO retailing on supply chains profit and individual decision-making under different bundling strategies. The authors developed different mathematical models in the TSBO retailing and bundling context and extended the earlier work in the area of integration frame.