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This article aims to investigate collaborative procurement as a sourcing strategy amongst competing small enterprises in an effort to reduce their material supply costs through increased efficiencies, bargaining power and economies of scale.

A case study approach is applied to a network of breweries that are regionally clustered. Interview data from producers, suppliers and industry experts is inductively interpreted to understand the viability, organisational impact and benefits/limitations of joint procurement activities.

The craft brewing industry follows a market place strategy of differentiation to achieve competitive advantage. This has supply chain implications that promote raw material diversity, which is in conflict with standardisation – a necessary factor for collective buying. Competition impacts information sharing and governance mechanism, while the structural factors of size asymmetry along and across the supply chain influence returns. These issues impact the potential economic benefits of collaborative procurement.

The research propositions have been developed in a specific industry but are generalisable to other companies with a differentiation strategy, especially in the consumer packaged goods sector.

Enabling conditions and constraints are captured in a framework and capability matrix, which can be used by practitioners to assess industry and product feasibility for collaborative procurement.

Previous studies of collaborative procurement have been in the public sector amongst large organisations. This work focusses on coopetition in the context of small businesses to identify the viability and cost-benefit of this strategy.

This research proposes to organise and distil this massive amount of data, making it easier to understand. Using data mining, machine learning techniques and visual approaches, researchers and managers can extract valuable insights (on guests' preferences) and convert them into strategic thinking based on exploration and predictive analysis. Consequently, this research aims to assist hotel managers in making informed decisions, thus improving the overall guest experience and increasing competitiveness.

This research employs natural language processing techniques, data visualisation proposals and machine learning methodologies to analyse unstructured guest service experience content. In particular, this research (1) applies data mining to evaluate the role and significance of critical terms and semantic structures in hotel assessments; (2) identifies salient tokens to depict guests' narratives based on term frequency and the information quantity they convey; and (3) tackles the challenge of managing extensive document repositories through automated identification of latent topics in reviews by using machine learning methods for semantic grouping and pattern visualisation.

This study’s findings (1) aim to identify critical features and topics that guests highlight during their hotel stays, (2) visually explore the relationships between these features and differences among diverse types of travellers through online hotel reviews and (3) determine predictive power. Their implications are crucial for the hospitality domain, as they provide real-time insights into guests' perceptions and business performance and are essential for making informed decisions and staying competitive.

This research seeks to minimise the cognitive processing costs of the enormous amount of content published by the user through a better organisation of hotel service reviews and their visualisation. Likewise, this research aims to propose a methodology and method available to tourism organisations to obtain truly useable knowledge in the design of the hotel offer and its value propositions.

This study aims to show how market orientation (MO), brand (BR) and business strategy (cost leadership strategy and differentiation strategy), which play mediating and moderating roles, respectively, can increase competitive advantage (CA). With a focus on brand, market orientation, cost leadership strategy (CS) and differentiation strategy (DS), as well as an analysis of variance control on varying business sizes per business seniority, the current study made a theoretical contribution.

An empirical study was created using a quantitative methodological technique. The surveyed data were collected from 379 managers or owners who participated in a face-to-face survey at different food processing companies in Vietnam. To test the hypotheses, the gathered information was examined utilizing multigroup analysis and partial least squares structural equation modeling.

The brand was found to have the greatest positive impact on competitive advantage, followed by a business strategy that positively influenced competitive advantage, and, finally, business strategies that significantly moderated the third strong positive impact between market orientation and competitive advantage. Market orientation has the fourth strong positive impact on competitive advantage, whereas brand has the lowest positive impact on market orientation.

This is the first investigation, according to the authors’ knowledge, into the role of market orientation as a mediator in the relationship between brand and competitive advantage in addition to the regulatory role of business strategy at two strategic levels: cost leadership and strategic focus as well as the difference between competitive advantage and market orientation in the Vietnamese food sector.

Avoided emissions refer to greenhouse gas emission reductions that are a result of using a product or are emission removals due to a decision or an action. Although there is no uniform standard for calculating avoided emissions, market actors have started referring to avoided emissions as “Scope 4” emissions. By default, making a claim about Scope 4 emissions gives an appearance that this Scope of emissions is a natural extension of the existing and accepted Scope-based emissions accounting framework. The purpose of this study is to explore the implications of this assumed legitimacy.

Via a desktop review and interviews, we analyse extant Scope 4 company reporting, associated accounting methodologies and the practical implications of Scope 4 claims.

Upon examination of Scope 4 emissions and their relationship with Scopes 1, 2 and 3 emissions, we highlight a dynamic and interdependent relationship between quantification, commensuration and standardization in emissions accounting. We find that extant Scope 4 assessments do not fit the established framework for Scope-based emissions accounting. In line with literature on the territorializing nature of accounting, we call for caution about Scope 4 claims that are a distraction from the critical work of reducing absolute emissions.

We examine the implications of assumed alignment and borrowed legitimacy of Scope 4 with Scope-based accounting because Scope 4 is not an actual Scope, but a claim to a Scope. This is as an act of accounting territorialization.

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the prominent cognitive biases that influence Lean practices in organisations that have a multi-cultural work environment which will aid the organisational managers and academics in enhancing the understanding of the human thought process and mitigate them suitably.

A multiple case study was conducted in organisations that were previously committed to Lean practices and had a multi-cultural work environment. This research was conducted on five companies based on 99 in-depth semi-structured interviews and seven process observations that sought to establish the system-wide cognitive biases present in a multi-cultural Lean environment.

The novel findings indicate that nine new biases influence Lean implementation and practices in a multi-cultural environment. This study also found strong connectivity between Lean practices and 45 previously identified biases that could affect positively or negatively the lean methodologies and their implementation. Biases were resilient enough that their influence on Lean in multi-cultural workplaces, even with transient populations, did not demonstrate cultural differentiation.

Like any qualitative research, constructivism and narrative analyses are subjected to understanding based on knowledge gained on the subject, and data may have been interpreted differently. Constructivist co-recreation of process scenarios based result limitations is therefore acknowledged. The interactive participation in exploring the knowledge sought after and interaction that could have a probable influence on the participant need to be acknowledged. However, the research design, multiple methods of data collection, generalisation based on data collection and analysis methods limit the effects of these and findings are reliable to a greater extent.

The results can provide an enhanced understanding of biases and insights into a new managerial approach to take remedial steps on biases’ influence on Lean practices that can result in improved productivity and well-being from a business process perspective. Understanding and mitigating the prominent biases can aid Lean manufacturing processes and support decision makers and line managers in improving lean methodologies’ effectiveness and productivity. The biases can be negated and used to implement decisions with ease. The influence of biases and the model could be used as a basis to counter implementation barriers.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that connects the cognitive perspectives of Lean business processes in a multi-cultural environment to identify the cognitive biases that influence Lean practices in organisations that were previously committed to Lean practices. The novel findings indicate that nine new biases and 45 previously identified biases influence Lean implementation and practices in a multi-cultural environment. The second novelty of this study shows the connection between cognitive biases, Lean implementation and practices in multi-cultural business processes.

This paper aims to examine the specific role that partnerships play in the relationship between adaptation strategy, international experience, and export performance of handicraft firms in an emerging country setting. The authors' purpose is to identify the key factors that may contribute to the success of export activities of small handicraft companies in international markets.

Drawing on a non-probability sampling technique, the authors collected survey data from 410 handicraft companies located in Morocco. The authors' conceptual model, which draws on the network theory, was tested using covariance-based Structural Equation Modeling by means of AMOS 24 Software.

The results indicate that adaptation marketing strategy and partnerships impact positively the export performance of handicraft firms. Partnerships also play an intermediary role by partially (fully) mediating the relationship between adaptation strategy (international experience) and export performance.

This study may assist marketers and entrepreneurs in handicraft companies to better understand the causal relationship between adaptation strategy, marketing experience and export performance of entrepreneurs' firms. Managers in these companies should be aware of the importance that partnerships play in boosting the export performance through marketing practices and experience.

The authors' paper contributes to the scant literature on the adaptation marketing strategy and export performance and the intermediary role of partnerships in the specific context of handicraft businesses operating in North African emerging markets, namely Morocco.

The purpose of this study is to, first, analyze the past years of research on international branding and, second, building on an early literature review, to analyze patterns in the field and suggest future research.

The analyzed papers were compiled using the Web of Science and Scopus databases. The author searched papers published between 2007 and 2023 that used terms related to international branding in their title, abstract and keywords.

This paper structures and identifies key institutions, papers, regions and authors in the field. It provides an overview of the past years of research in the area. The study identifies important gaps in the literature and suggests further research dealing with, for example, the B2B sector and emerging markets.

Despite the increase in international branding studies, few literature reviews have been published since 2007. This review fills this research gap. It identifies future research areas dealing with branding in the B2B sector, branding in emerging markets, branding process and implementation studies using longitudinal methods and more practical research.

This paper aims to study whether international niche market leaders (INMLs) gained their leading position as early mover or diligent follower, and assess whether they leveraged hard or soft forms of technological, supply pre-emption and customer lock-in advantage mechanisms.

Empirical material stems from qualitative and quantitative data on a sample of 20 niche companies from the Basque Country (Spain) that operate in business to business markets.

The sample predominantly followed an early entrant strategy and applied soft measures to reach niche market leadership.

Findings imply that early entering fosters conquering leadership in niche markets, that pioneer advantage is easier to sustain in niches than in mainstream markets, and that soft measures are more effective in niche markets than in larger markets. A limitation to our findings is that they follow from explorative research on a sample of firms from a reduced geographic setting.

Hidden champions and INMLs can be important sources of technological progress and economic value for the localities that host them. Therefore, despite their traditional low profile and the fact that they are not always the largest firms around, policymakers may want to pay more attention to this type of companies.

Tot he best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to research entry timing and its outcome for market leadership with regard to niche players or hidden champions-type of firms. It introduces an original taxonomy to operationalize and distinguish between hard and soft measures to leverage advantage mechanisms related to market entry timing.