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The advanced technology enables retailers to develop customer profile analysis (CPA) to implement personalized pricing. However, considering the efficiency of developing CPA, the benefit to different retailers of implementing more precise personalized pricing remains unclear. Thus, this essay aimed to investigate the impact of efficiency on participants’ strategies and profits in the supply chain.

A two-stage game model was introduced in the presence of a manufacturer who sets his wholesale price and a retailer that decides her CPA strategy. The equilibrium results were generated by backward induction.

Most retailers are willing to develop the highest CPA to implement perfect personalized pricing, but those inefficient retailers with high production costs would like to determine a middle CPA to implement bounded personalized pricing. The retailers’ profits may decrease with the efficiency of developing CPA when the efficiency is middle. In this case, as the efficiency improves, the manufacturer increases the wholesale price, resulting in lower demand and thus lower profits. Moreover, define a Pareto Improvement (PI) strategy as one that benefits both manufacturers and retailers. Therefore, uniform pricing is a PI when the unit cost is high and the efficiency is low; personalized pricing is a PI when the unit cost is low and the efficiency is low or high; otherwise, there is no PI.

This study is the first that investigates how the retailer develops CPA to implement personalized pricing on a comprehensive spectrum, which can provide practical insights for retailers with different efficiencies.

This paper aims to demonstrate that, in line with the emerging trend of multifunctional yarn development, cotton yarn can effectively harness renewable solar energy to achieve photothermal conversion and thermochromism. This innovation not only maintains the comfort associated with natural fiber cotton yarn but also enhances its ultraviolet (UV) light resistance.

In this work, 4% zirconium carbide (ZrC) and thermochromic powder were adhered to cotton yarn through polyurethane (PU) by sizing coating method. After sizing, the two cotton yarns are twisted by ring spinning to obtain composite yarns with photothermal conversion and thermochromic functions.

The yarn obtained by cotton/6%PU/8% thermochromic dye single yarn and cotton/6%PU/4% ZrC single yarn composite is the best match. After 5 min of infrared light, the temperature of the composite yarn rose to the maximum, increasing by 36.1°C. The ΔE* value before and after irradiation of infrared lamp is 26.565, which proves that the thermochromic function is good. The yarn dryness unevenness was significantly reduced by 27.2%. The composite yarn has a UPF value of up to 89.22, and its performance characteristics remain stable after 100 minutes of washing.

The composite yarn’s photothermal conversion and thermochromism functions are mutually reinforcing. Using sunlight can simultaneously achieve heating and discoloration effects without consuming additional energy. The cotton yarn used in this application is versatile, and suitable for a wide range of uses including clothing, temperature visualization detection and other scenarios.

The purpose of the work reported in this paper is to prepare hybrid pigments fabricated by depositing pigment yellow 12 (PY12) on the surface of silica gel to improve the application performance of the resulting pigments. The particle size distribution, optical properties, thermal stability, water dispersibility and flowability of the pigments with and without silica gel modification were studied.

The hybrid pigments were synthesised with different amount of silica gel. The modified pigments were characterised by Fourier transforms infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, thermal analysis, scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy.

The particle size distribution of the modified pigments was found to have been altered significantly. This can be explained by the interaction between pigments and silica gel, which prevented self-aggregation of pigment particles and hence improved the properties of pigments.

Only silica supports and pigment yellow 12 were evaluated. Other pigments could also be studied.

Modification of pigment particles with smaller particle size can increase the efficiency of the modified pigment, in terms of colour shade and tinting strength, due to better particle size distribution.

The paper demonstrates that inorganic core can prevent self-aggregation of pigment particles, and the application properties of such pigment depend on the resulting degree of dispersion of pigment particles.