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Following the contextual approach to intellectual capital, this study analyzed the specific types of external relational capital that foster product/service, process and managerial innovativeness in organic farming as key drivers of sustainable food production.

Survey data from 358 organically certified Spanish farmers were analyzed using structural equation modeling based on partial least squares. A total of three models, one for each type of innovativeness, were developed to analyze the impact of external relational capital. These models took into account four specific types of relational capital: vertical relationships, horizontal relationships, relationships with government institutions and relationships with knowledge-intensive institutions.

Although relational capital and innovativeness are clearly underdeveloped, knowledge generated through and embedded in external relationships plays a substantial role in promoting innovativeness in organic farming. Moreover, depending on the type of innovation to be developed, the type of external relational capital that is relevant differs.

This study's findings indicate that organic farmers prioritize process innovation over product/service and managerial innovation. For the latter categories, building relationships with customers, consumers and government institutions is key. Policymakers should encourage farmer-engaging socialization spaces that emphasize family farms and their knowledge contribution.

Past studies have examined the overall degree of association between external relational capital and innovation, often overlooking the nuances of contextual factors. In contrast, this research delves into the unique contributions of knowledge sourced from various external relationships, focusing specifically on how these relationships influence different types of innovation within the specific context of organic farming.

Effective and flexible organizational models have become an avenue for driving smallholder competitiveness in the agricultural sector. However, little is understood about the processes by which resource-constrained actors deploy their organizational networks to generate and retain value in rapidly changing agrifood environments. This study examines the moderating effects of business contingencies on the interplay between organizational relationships and the resource-based performance of small-scale farmers in a developing country.

The authors propose a novel conceptual framework grounded in the relational view, netchain and contingency theories. Cross-sectional data obtained from 330 maize farmers in rural Zambia were analyzed using variance-based structural equation modeling, which involves mediation-moderation analysis.

The results show that all relational networks – vertical, horizontal and lateral – positively mediate the effects farm resources and social capital have on farmers' performance. However, these effects change depending on the predominant agency situations. Specifically, asymmetric power from customers and reputable competitors weakens the positive effect of closer horizontal relationships on business performance, while the positive effect of tighter informal vertical relationships on farmers' performance weakens under conditions of high affective trust. Moreover, the gender-based multigroup analyses highlight variations in the contingent relational view of men- and women-headed households.

The study relies on cross-sectional data from one agribusiness sector in Zambia, thus generalizations should be cautious.

The uniqueness of this study lies in the proposed theoretical framework and new empirical insights, which extend the scope of the relational view to small-scale farming households in developing countries.

The research question is how can a company implement a circular innovation in a supply network context? Leveraging the main conceptual and interpretative models of the industrial marketing and purchasing thinking, this study aims to investigate the interplay between the process of circular innovation development and the changes in the structure and dynamics of the supply network in which innovation takes place.

This research applies a case study design focusing on participant interaction dynamics. The case relates to an industrial company producing an innovative coating solution for compostable packaging. The data used to develop the case study came from multiple sources but primarily from semistructured interviews that cover the implementation of the circular innovation and the configuration of the circular network.

The dynamics of interconnected relationships can configure a circular network that interconnects business and non business actors through vertical, horizontal and heterogeneous relationships. The network configuration is supported by the new mobilizer actor that facilitates the sharing of circular knowledge within the circular network, together with the sharing of a market orientation and entrepreneurial orientation within the supply network, through the educational learning path.

This paper aims to contribute to a new understanding of how circular innovation can be developed, adopted and diffused. In a network, when circular innovation takes place, the focal issue is not the new product or technology in itself but how such innovation is developed and implemented by and through the reconfiguration of the business and non-business relationships into circular network.

Research efforts aiming to improve understanding of how various organisational relationships contribute to better food quality (FQ) in a constantly changing business environment are limited. This study examines the effects of supply chain (SC) organisations on the quality of food products across multi-tiered segments with dynamic business situations.

Guided by a conceptual research framework based on contingency theory and netchain analysis, moderation-based partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was used to analyse multi-tiered data from 405 shrimpers and 238 women processors in Akwa-Ibom, Lagos and Ondo states in Nigeria.

The authors' findings show that unpredictable business environments such as market turbulence (MT), power asymmetry (PA) and distrust (DT) not only directly influence SC organisations but also moderate how organisational networks contribute to improved FQ. Further results reveal that closer vertical ties such as relational contracts are prerequisites for small-scale actors to guarantee improved FQ along multiple nodes of the food system.

This is the first study to examine, from a contingency and multi-tiered perspective, how small-scale actors can maintain FQ across interdependent nodes of a food chain in a developing country context and to explore the complex interplay between SC networks and the quality of highly perishable food products in unpredictable business environments. Relevant theoretical and policy implications are discussed.

We present configurational theorising as a novel approach to developing middle-range theory in two steps: (1) we illustrate configurational theorising as a new form of supply chain inquiry by connecting its philosophical assumptions with a methodological execution, and (2) we generate new insights underpinning a middle-range theory for supply chain resilience.

We synthesise information from a range of sources and invoke ‘critical realism” to suggest a five-phase configurational theorising roadmap to develop middle-range theory. We demonstrate this roadmap to explain supply chain resilience by analysing qualitative data from 22 organisations within the Australian food supply chain.

Coopetition and supply chain collaboration are necessary causal conditions, but they need to combine with either supply chain agility or multi-sourcing strategy to build supply chain resilience. Asymmetrical analyses showed that the simultaneous absence of supply chain collaboration, supply chain agility and multi-sourcing results in low supply chain resilience, but coopetition was indifferent to low supply chain resilience. Similarly, high supply chain resilience is possible with the non-presence of supply chain agility and multi-sourcing.

The configurational middle-range theorising roadmap presented and empirically tested in this paper constitutes a substantial advancement to both theory and the methodological domain.

This is the first attempt at developing a middle-range theory for supply chains by explicitly drawing on configurational theorising.

This study aims to conduct a thorough literature review to map current studies on international marketing capabilities (IMCs) applying dynamic capabilities view (DCV). The aim of this study is to increase the chances for more conceptual and terminological rigor in future research in this particular research area.

This is a systematic literature review following the established review process of reviews in leading (international) marketing journals. A multilevel analytical approach was adopted, combining inductive coding with deductive coding and following the logic of antecedents-phenomena-consequences.

Synthesis of 20 rigorously selected previous empirical studies on IMCs applying DCV reveals that academic interest in these capabilities is well justified and growing and there are some well researched antecedents to focal capabilities (e.g. inter-organizational capabilities, outside-in market orientation) as well as their prevalent consequences (e.g. export and innovation performance). There is little knowledge of moderators to these links, especially with regard to consequences. This review illustrates that the current research lacks consistency in how key constructs are defined and measured, provides the guide to future conceptualization and measurement of so-called International Dynamic Marketing Capabilities (IDMCs) and proposes some concrete research directions.

The authors extend prior research in the investigated topic by critically evaluating prior works, providing improved conceptualization of IDMCs as well as concrete research agenda for IDMCs structured along recommendations for Theory, Context and Methods (TCM framework).

Prior studies on major customer relationships (i.e. embedded ties) focus mostly on the ties between a focal firm and its immediate customers, hindering the understanding of the influence of indirect ties (both upstream and downstream) on a focal firm's operational performance. In this study, the authors analyze how a focal firm's upstream and downstream connectedness and network location affect its productive efficiency.

Utilizing Compustat segment files, the authors constructed large-scale major customer networks covering the period 2007–2013. The authors applied a fixed-effect panel stochastic frontier model to conduct estimation. Moreover, the authors applied an endogenous panel stochastic frontier model to ensure the robustness of the main analysis.

The authors found that a focal firm's upstream and downstream connectedness both have a positive influence on a firm's productive efficiency, whereas a focal firm's centeredness in the major customer network has a negative influence on productive efficiency. Moreover, it was found that centeredness lessens the positive influences of upstream and downstream connectedness on productive efficiency. The post hoc analysis further confirmed that a focal firm's indirect ties, both upstream and downstream, positively influence a focal firm's productive efficiency.

This study contributes to the literature by evaluating the relative effectiveness of a focal firm's direct and indirect major customer ties, both upstream and downstream. More importantly, this study suggests potential exploitation–exploration trade-offs (i.e. productive efficiency vs. innovation) triggered by a firm's network location.

This study aims to study research on franchise chain performance that has focused on franchisors’ efforts to align their interests with those of franchisees to address partner uncertainty. In contrast, the question of what a franchisor should do to address another type of uncertainty and task uncertainty remains understudied. The authors suggest a franchisor’s coordination as a key means of alleviating task uncertainty and ongoing support and plural form as two mechanisms of coordination. The authors also posit that aligned interests between the franchisor and the franchisee improve, whereas one-sided interest impedes, chain performance. Furthermore, providing greater ongoing support or deploying plural form amplifies the positive effect of aligned interests on chain performance.

The authors relied on secondary data to test the hypotheses. The authors collected data for analysis from Bond’s franchisee guide and Nation’s Restaurant News restaurant database. They also tested the framework by analyzing 17-year, panel data of 71 restaurant chains operating in the USA and Canada using system generalized method of moments.

Results show that aligning interests does improve chain performance, but that the positive effect is amplified when aligned interests are matched with a chain’s provision of ongoing support or use of plural form.

The authors explicate why it is not enough to address the misaligned interests or lack of coordination alone; a chain manager needs to address both of these problems together. In addition, the authors explicate how two franchisee coordination mechanisms – ongoing support and plural form – help a chain augment the beneficial effect of aligning interests on chain performance. Without solving the twin problems of misaligned interests and coordination simultaneously, a chain is unlikely to achieve its full performance potential.

Much has been written on the effect of fast-moving business environments on organizational and supply chain (SC) management. Yet, empirical findings on the effect of changing external and internal contingencies on today’s globalized agrifood SC networks and performance are still fragmented into different organizational instruments, with some conflicting results remaining unexplained. This study aims to address these deficiencies by providing a comprehensive research framework to investigate how SC external and internal contingencies jointly influence organizational SC network structures and agrifood performance across mutually dependent tiers.

Using partial least squares structural equation modeling, the so-called “contingency–netchain–performance” framework, based on contingent resource-based theory and the netchain approach, was empirically tested on data obtained from a standardized survey of 405 artisanal producers and 238 processors in the Nigerian shrimp sector.

The results provide statistical evidence that supports the path dependency of firm performance from the interplay of vertical, horizontal and lateral relationships and, primordially, from both external and internal contingencies. The findings show that the contingency paradigm of fit among small-scale food producers and processors cuts across tiers and uncover a tendency to adopt relational governance and tighter network structures that result in an organic organization as the best-fitting structure.

The paper presents a new research framework that offers comprehensive empirical explanations for the joint influence of SC external and internal contingencies on organizational SC network structures and performance across mutually dependent agrifood tiers. This study’s conceptual, practical and policy implications for SC management provide a nascent and flexible basis on which to identify the best-fitting organizational strategies that maximize firm performance across agrifood SC tiers characterized by changing business environments.

Research on vertical line extensions shows that consumers tend to evaluate upward extensions higher than downward ones. This paper examines the opposite situation. It also investigates the process underlying consumer responses by identifying a moderator and mediators.

Two studies were conducted to assess the effect of extension direction (upward vs downward) on consumers' extension evaluations. Study 1 incorporated implicit theories of relationships (the growth belief) as a moderator and inferred motives for launching a vertical line extension as mediators in the effect. Study 2 presented a firm's rationale for undertaking the extension to examine whether it influenced evaluations.

Consumers' preferences for downward over upward extensions appeared in markets where the exclusivity of luxury brands had been reduced. However, the resistance to upward extensions was weaker when consumers endorsed stronger growth beliefs in human relationships. Consumers inferred customer- and selling-oriented motives more strongly from downward than upward extensions, enhancing the evaluations. Finally, when presenting a rationale for launching an extension in the launch announcement, customer-oriented reasoning raised the evaluations higher than selling-oriented reasoning but did not elevate the evaluations higher than the announcement showing no reason.

This study advances the literature on vertical line extensions and shows that consumers' preference for upward over downward extensions is not universal. The opposite pattern exists in markets with a lower distinction between high- and low-end brands. It supports the theoretical notion that responses are driven by the differences in growth belief and in cognitive inferences vis-à-vis motives.