مقاله انگلیسی رایگان در مورد قیمت گذاری در یک زنجیره تامین دو کانالی – الزویر 2019

This study investigates the strategic effect of return policies in a dual-channel supply chain, in which a manufacturer can sell products directly to end customers and indirectly via an independent retailer. The manufacturer decides whether to implement a return policy in either the direct or indirect channel, or in both channels. When the return policy is provided, the cost of returned products has to be covered by the corresponding channel. We consider four possible strategies, including full refund in the direct channel only, full refund in the indirect channel only, full refund in both channels, and no refund in both channels. Given the equilibrium pricing strategies of firms, the preferences of firms over different strategies are determined by comparisons between the anticipated return rate of customers and their perceived value of the return policy. The manufacturer prefers the full-refund policy in both channels when the return rate of the customer is low. Otherwise, the dominant strategy for the manufacturer is the no-refund policy in both channels. The retailer benefits more from the full-refund policy in the indirect channel alone when the return rate is low; otherwise, the retailer prefers the full-refund policy in the direct channel only.

Introduction

Customers in numerous industries have a legal right to return their purchased products to original manufacturers or retailers for any reason (Mostard and Teunter, 2006). In 2007, the U.S. electronics industry spent approximately $13.8 billion on returned products, in which only approximately 5% were defective (Lawton, 2008). According to Jim Brill, the reverse logistics marketing manager for UPS, the expense of returns processing ranges from 20% to 65% of the cost of goods sold1 . This phenomenon is even more prevalent in online shopping because e-commerce products are usually characterized by substantial numbers and high return rates (Choi et al., 2004; Disney et al., 2004; Cho et al., 2008; Yang et al., 2015). Based on an Invesp infographic of online return rates, online shoppers return at least 30% of their purchases, whereas in physical stores less than 9% return their purchases2 . The preceding discussion explicitly shows that product return is no longer a small part of the business process. Numerous scholars (Chen and Bell, 2011; Chen and Grewal, 2013; Chen and Bell, 2013) also indicate that offering a return experience should be viewed as an important weapon for a firm to build a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Although a substantial body of literature discusses the manner in which return policies affect the profits of channel members (Chen and Bell, 2011; Chen and Bell, 2013), most studies focus on a traditional supply chain setting where manufacturers sell products via retailers exclusively. Nonetheless, an increasing number of manufacturers now have an attempt to sell to customers via retailers and e-commerce. For example, Dell, which is known for its success in the direct-selling mode, announced that it would build an indirect selling channel to take the advantage of both channels and to stimulate sales.