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As the concept of corporate sustainable management activities (CSMA) has become an increasingly important element of corporate management, much attention has been paid to its impact on customer relationship. Although there exists many studies concentrating mainly on the environment aspect of CSMA, only a few address the three dimensions of CSMA (environmental, social and economic) and examine their comprehensive impact on relationship marketing. In an attempt to fill this gap, the purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the influence of CSMA on customer satisfaction (CS), word of mouth intention (WOMI) and repurchase intention (RI).

The data come from 214 shipping industry practitioners (shippers, freight forwarders and third party logistics service providers in South Korea). Structural equation modeling (SEM) is employed to test the impact of CSMA on CS, WOMI and RI.

Based on a survey conducted in South Korea, the findings indicate that environmental and economic aspects of CSMA play a significant role in enhancing CS and the enhanced CS positively affects WOMI and RI.

As the field data were obtained from only one industry, future replication of the findings to other industries should consider industry-specific factors, if applicable.

The results highlight several implications for shipping industry practitioners to consider when establishing the strategy for effective corporate sustainable management to enhance CS.

This study is one of the first empirical attempts to explore how CSMA affects CS in the shipping industry. In addition, this paper empirically investigates the influence of CS on WOMI and RI.

Anchoring on configuration theory, the purpose of this paper is to evaluate how supply chain relationship quality (SCRQ) differs across firm characteristics (FC) in the maritime logistics industry. In addition, it utilises transactional cost theory to establish the relationship between SCRQ and supply chain performance (SCP).

The data were obtained from a survey with 205 maritime logistics service players (shipping firms, shippers and freight forwarders) in Singapore. MANOVA and t-test analyses are used to examine the difference in SCRQ (i.e. trust and commitment) across FC which includes firm types and ownership types. Thereafter, structural equation modelling is employed to examine the influence of SCRQ on SCP.

The results indicate that the effects of trust and commitment on SCRQ vary significantly. It was also found that trust as an aspect of SCRQ has a significant impact on SCP, whereas commitment does not.

As the field data were obtained from only one industry, future replication of the findings to other industries should consider industry-specific factors, if applicable.

It is suggested that maritime logistics service players should carefully manage trust and commitment to simultaneously enable SCP. By identifying the various aspects of FC that contribute to SCRQ, maritime logistics service providers could devise appropriate strategies for different customer segments more effectively.

This study expands current supply chain research by linking two dimensions of SCRQ in relationship marketing with SCP in supply chain management. It is also one of the first empirical attempts to explore the role of FC in the linkage between SCRQ and SCP in the maritime logistics industry.