Despite the publication of several studies examining European retailing in relation to the USA, there is still a dearth of recent research, in English, that explores the development of retailing in specific European countries (with the obvious exception of Britain), over the twentieth century. Even for the UK, more research is needed to challenge claims such as the alleged "backwardness" of British retailing relative to North America, or the presence of formidable "environmental" barriers to the "industrialisation" of retailing in Britain. New Perspectives on 20th Century European Retailing showcases new research on various aspects of twentieth century European retailing, that challenges the traditional view that Europe was a "follower" of America in retail innovation. It brings together work by several - mainly early career - scholars, who are doing innovative, archival-based, research on various aspects of European retail history. Following a general review of European retailing by the editors (discussing key debates and new approaches) seven thematic chapters present work that either sheds new light on old debates and/or explores hitherto neglected topics. Collectively, they show that whereas retailers are often regarded as 'intermediaries', in fact they are actors in their own right and they challenge the traditional view that Europe was a "follower" of America in retail innovation. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the Business History journal.

Gender After Gender in Consumer Culture provides an updated discussion of how gender cuts across consumer culture, in light of increasing gender fragmentation and integration with other identity positions. Sex, the biological distinction male/female, and gender, which refers to a person's sense of being male, female, or any other combinations of these, inform issues as varied as personal identity, social interactions, and market behaviours. First, contributions account for the increasing fluidity and/or fragmentation of gender positions, which reshape the interplay between consumers and marketers. Second, they provide a timely illustration of how consumption and markets concur in contrasting gender inequalities, taken both individually and jointly (e.g., at the intersection of ethnicity or positions of market marginalisation). Third, chapters question the role of gender in granting personal and societal well-being, as they reflect on the collective capacity of constantly undoing gender stereotypes. Focusing on gender, this book allows the reader to trace the links among cultural categories (e.g. masculinity, femininity, gender identity), social phenomena, and market (dis)functioning. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue in the journal Consumption Markets & Culture.

While many sectors have been badly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, e-retailing is one of the booming sectors during this period. Actually, the e-retailing sector was already booming even before the global pandemic. Although e-retailing offers many opportunities for businesses and consumers, there are several issues associated with e-consumer protection. This book examines how consumers are protected on the online marketplace in the context of ASEAN countries. Specifically, this project: (i) Discusses the six issues of e-consumer protection (e.g., information about transaction, product quality, privacy, security, redress, and jurisdiction); (ii) Examines the policy/governance approach adopted by different sectors to address the issues of e-consumer protection; and (iii) Proposes a multi-sector governance framework for e-consumer protection. Three short case studies on Lazada in Singapore, Shopee in Vietnam, and Zalora in Malaysia are also included to illustrate how well-known e-retailers protect their e-customers. Overall, this book is interdisciplinary, including research on consumer protection, governance, management, and policy/regulation. It provides sources of information and knowledge which focus on both theoretical and practical aspects of e-consumer protection in ASEAN countries. Also, the roles from different sectors are examined to produce comprehensive findings and analysis of the governance process.

Summarizing the extant research on marketing communications, social media and word of mouth, this book clarifies terms often incorrectly and interchangeably used by scholars and marketers and provides principles of effective marketing communications in social media for different brand types and in different geographic markets. Conversations among consumers on social media now have an unprecedented ability to shape attitudes toward people, products, services, brands and to influence buying decisions. Consequently, the digital era brings to the fore the importance of interpersonal relations and the power of personal recommendations. This book is the first to empirically investigate how the form and appeal of marketing communications in social networks influence electronic word of mouth, including an examination of brand type and geographic market. The author focuses on motivations and reveals why people exchange opinions about brands, products and services in the digital environment. The book summarizes the existing research on marketing communications, social media and word of mouth, provides a cutting-edge knowledge based on the analysis of the actual behavior of consumers and rules of effective marketing communications in social media. This research-based book is written for scholars and researchers within the fields of marketing and communication. It may also be of interest to a wider audience interested in understanding how to use social media to influence electronic word of mouth.

The Routledge Companion to Strategic Marketing offers the latest insights into marketing strategy. Bodo Schlegelmilch and Russ Winer present 29 specially commissioned chapters, which include up-to-date thinking on a diverse range of marketing strategy topics. Readers benefit from the latest strategic insights of leading experts from universities around the world. Contributing authors are from, among others, the U.S. (Berkeley, Cornell, MIT, New York University, Texas A&M), Europe (the Hanken School of Economics, INSEAD, the University of Oxford, the University of Groningen, WU Vienna) and Asia (the Indian School of Business, Tongji University). The topics addressed include economic foundations of marketing strategy, competition in digital marketing strategy (e.g. mobile payment systems and social media strategy), marketing strategy, and corporate social responsibility, as well as perspectives on capturing the impact of marketing strategy. Collectively, this authoritative guide is an accessible tool for researchers, students, and practitioners.

This book examines real estate markets and urban development in Central America, Mexico and The Caribbean (CAMEC). It considers both residential and commercial real estate with a focus on industrial and hospitality sectors, infrastructure and logistics. The CAMEC region is besieged by complexity. Prone to natural disasters, and with the Mexico/US border constituting the largest human migration corridor on Earth, the region is also a vital trading hub for goods, linking commerce between the world's two largest oceans and the Americas. The real estate markets in this area are dynamic, rapidly developing and under researched. This book analyses the particularities of these markets and the context in which investors and developers operate. The authors present case studies and contributions from key players in major cities in the region. The book exposes the regional risks and opportunities connected to urban development including market transparency, urban equity and development regulation. The research presented in this volume gives the reader a comprehensive picture of each country under study, detailing their individual commercial, residential, industrial, leisure and infrastructure sectors. This is essential reading for international investors, real estate students, researchers, and professionals with an interest in the region.

Few crises in modern history have so completely disrupted every aspect of daily life as has the COVID-19 pandemic. What began as a small medical ripple in Wuhan, China, a city many of us had never heard of, quickly erupted into a tsunami of epic proportions. Every market, industry, vertical, profession, service, and category of product was in some way rocked by its impact. And, for the first time in recorded history, every wheel, cog and gear in the global retail industry ground to a virtual halt. From two-time, international best-selling author and futurist Doug Stephens, Resurrecting Retail is not just a riveting story of the unprecedented crash of an industry during this time of crisis but a roadmap for its rebirth. Meticulously researched in real time from inside the crisis, Resurrecting Retail provides a comprehensive and surprising vision of how COVID-19 will reshape every aspect of consumer life, including the very essence of why we shop. Above all, Resurrecting Retail provides an inspirational and actionable future vision for any business leader looking not only to survive but to thrive in a very different looking post-pandemic retail world.

This book is the first book that provides comprehensive economic analysis of cross-border outsourcing by Japanese manufacturing firms based on microdata. Previous literature on many other countries has often been constrained by limited data availability about outsourcing, but research contained in this book exploits unique firm-level data and directly tests theoretical hypotheses derived from new firm heterogeneity trade models. Productivity, capital-labor ratio and R&D intensity are examined at the firm level. While rich empirical results in this book convince us how powerful the orthodox economic theory is in understanding Japanese firms, detailed firm-level findings, combined with accessible and concise overviews of Japanese international trade, are widely informative for international economists, experts of Japanese society, business strategists for offshoring, and policy makers in both developed and developing economies. This book further discusses how boundaries of Japanese firms, traditionally sheltered by language and cultural barriers, are affected by outsourcing decisions simultaneously crossing national borders and firm boundaries. The interpretations of Japanese characteristics in outsourcing have deep implications for understanding drastically changing Japanese business amid globalization.

Retail history is a rich, cross-disciplinary field that demonstrates the centrality of retailing to many aspects of human experience, from the provisioning of everyday goods to the shaping of urban environments; from earning a living to the construction of identity. Over the last few decades, interest in the history of retail has increased greatly, spanning centuries, extending to all areas of the globe, and drawing on a range of disciplinary perspectives. By offering an up-to-date, comprehensive thematic, spatial and chronological coverage of the history of retailing, this Companion goes beyond traditional narratives that are too simplistic and Euro-centric and offers a vibrant survey of this field. It is divided into four broad sections: 1) Contexts, 2) Spaces and places, 3) People, processes and practices and 4) Geographical variations. Chapters are written in an analytical and synthetic manner, accessible to the general reader as well as challenging for specialists, and with an international perspective. This volume is an important resource to a wide range of readers, including marketing and management specialists, historians, geographers, economists, sociologists and urban planners.

The retail sector is an integral part of a national economy. From the political economy perspective, all consumer goods have surplus values locked up in them; the surplus values are not realized until the consumer goods are purchased by consumers through various distribution channels. As such, retailing is the essential link between production and consumption. The success of a retail business depends on two general factors: the location of the retail outlet, and management of the business. Both factors are equally important. If the business is located in the wrong place with the wrong customer base, it will not generate expected sales. Similarly, if the business is poorly managed and operated, it will not perform well even if the location is right. Influenced by both traditional and new location theories, Retail Geography is conceptualized and organized using the retail planning process as the framework. The technical and methodological chapters help guide the reader with detailed descriptions of the techniques and are supported with practical examples to reflect the latest software development. Retail Geography provides a state-of-the-art summary and will act as a core textbook for undergraduate and graduate students of economic geography interested in specializing in retail and business geography. The practical examples also make it a valuable handbook for practitioners in the field, as well as students of retail management and commercial real estate management.

The retail sector is an integral part of a national economy. From the political economy perspective, all consumer goods have surplus values locked up in them; the surplus values are not realized until the consumer goods are purchased by consumers through various distribution channels. As such, retailing is the essential link between production and consumption. The success of a retail business depends on two general factors: the location of the retail outlet, and management of the business. Both factors are equally important. If the business is located in the wrong place with the wrong customer base, it will not generate expected sales. Similarly, if the business is poorly managed and operated, it will not perform well even if the location is right. Influenced by both traditional and new location theories, Retail Geography is conceptualized and organized using the retail planning process as the framework. The technical and methodological chapters help guide the reader with detailed descriptions of the techniques and are supported with practical examples to reflect the latest software development. Retail Geography provides a state-of-the-art summary and will act as a core textbook for undergraduate and graduate students of economic geography interested in specializing in retail and business geography. The practical examples also make it a valuable handbook for practitioners in the field, as well as students of retail management and commercial real estate management.

Published in 1999, this book presents the results of an ethnographic study of the emergence of co-operative production networks among hog farm workers in Iowa. In it the author assesses both the internal organizational requirements for the successful network formation and the potential for networks to give farmers a competitive edge in the swine industry. Departing from the traditional emphasis on individual decision making in agricultural economies and economic anthropology, this book emphasizes instead the institutional setting in which such networks are formed. The author argues that networks succeed when they are closely tied to and reflective of local social structure. Those networks that attempt to employ a master plan designed by experts often fail. Although many succesful networks exist, networking has yet to achieve the economic clout enjoyed by large scale corporate swine producers. The author describes the availability of credit for new swine production ventures in Iowa and shows the extent to which large scale producers have developed network-like connections with banks, packers, and contract producers.

This book offers essential insights into various management concepts for retail and consumer packaged goods companies. Addressing a range of topics in the field of performance management, it presents concepts for management control, management reporting, planning & forecasting, as well as digitization-related aspects. The contributing authors share valuable lessons learned from real-world consulting projects and present innovative approaches to successful and effective management control at retail and consumer packaged goods companies.

Fashion buying and merchandising has changed dramatically over the last 20 years. Aspects such as the advent of new technologies and the changing nature of the industry into one that is faster paced than ever before, as well as the shift towards more ethical and sustainable practices have resulted in a dramatic change of the roles. As a result, contemporary fast fashion retailers do not follow the traditional buying cycle processes step by step, critical paths are wildly different, and there has been a huge increase in 'in-season buying' as a response to heightened consumer demand. This textbook is a comprehensive guide to 21st-century fashion buying and merchandising, considering fast fashion, sustainability, ethical issues, omnichannel retailing, and computer-aided design. It presents an up-to-date buying cycle that reflects key aspects of fashion buying and merchandising, as well as in-depth explanations of fashion product development, trend translation, and sourcing. It applies theoretical and strategic business models to buying and merchandising that have traditionally been used in marketing and management. This book is ideal for all fashion buying and merchandising students, specifically second- and final-year undergraduate as well as MA/MSc fashion students. It will also be useful to academics and practitioners who wish to gain a greater understanding of the industry today.

Wal-Mart is America's largest retailer. The national chain of stores is a powerful stand-in of both the promise and perils of free market capitalism. Yet it is also often the target of public outcry for its labor practices, to say nothing of class-action lawsuits, and a central symbol in America's increasingly polarized political discourse over consumption, capitalism and government regulations. In many ways the battle over Wal-Mart is the battle between "Main Street" and "Wall Street" as the fate of workers under globalization and the ability of the private market to effectively distribute precious goods like health care take center stage. In Wal-Mart Wars, Rebekah Massengill shows that the economic debates are not about dollars and cents, but instead represent a conflict over the deployment of deeper symbolic ideas about freedom, community, family, and citizenship. Wal-Mart Wars argues that the family is not just a culture wars issue to be debated with regard to same-sex marriage or the limits of abortion rights; rather, the family is also an idea that shapes the ways in which both conservative and progressive activists talk about economic issues, and in the process, construct different moral frameworks for evaluating capitalism and its most troubling inequalities. With particular attention to political activism and the role of big business to the overall economy, Massengill shows that the fight over the practices of this multi-billion dollar corporation can provide us with important insight into the dreams and realities of American capitalism.

This book, by one of China's leading economists, explores the past and present of the RMB-the people's currency-as it is poised to compete with the dollar as the international reserve currency. Exchange rate movement and its pass-through to changes in domestic prices have been topics of wide concern among economists. However, relatively few studies have empirically investigated the relationship between exchange rate movements and China's international trade.This book fills this gap, using the general equilibrium theory of the western economic science norm systems, integrating the leading heterogeneous firm theory of international trade, attempting to set up a theoretical structural model for further prediction, and applying the data from sample cases to examine the structural model. This book will be of interest to economists, financiers, and China watchers.

Originally published in 1990, Urban Markets looks at how the informal sector of the economy should be encouraged to assist in the alleviation of problems of poverty and unemployment. Despite this rhetoric, few concrete, implementable ways have been developed. This book is concerned with one such potential strategy which the authors consider to be particularly effective: the creation of both built and open markets for very small retailers and wholesalers. Based on experience of observing such markets in several continents, the authors combine a discussion of the theoretical issues surrounding the creation of urban markets with practical hints of how to establish and run them.

The furniture industry serves as an indicator for the changing state of American manufacturing. A brief history of U.S. furniture manufacturing creates the context for continuing geographic shifts among Asian locations, foreign ownership impacts and global market considerations, as well as the demands of three significant domestic market demographics. The furniture industry is separated into its various parts from wood to metal, home to institutional markets. Government actions including tariffs, health, and environmental regulations are also considered. Based on numerous interviews and site visits, strategies of corporate survivors in the face of mergers, and emergence of new players are profiled to indicate practices for increasing adaptive capacity and marketing the appeal of "made here". This book highlights the role of global networks, lean and green production methods, customized quality versus price competitiveness, online outreach along with showroom access, labor issues, and related factors that continue to compel location shifts and extensions.

As with executives and managers in so many other business functions, pricing specialists are being challenged more and more to substantiate the added value of their activities. Pricing is a core function of every business, and needs not only to contribute positively to short- and long-term results, but also to document its impact to the bottom line. A fundamental part of this is the pricing ROI calculations. This book, edited by globally renowned thought leaders Andreas Hinterhuber and Stephan Liozu, is the first to outline contemporary theories and best practices of documenting pricing ROI. It provides proven methods, practices and theories on how to calculate the impact of pricing activities on performance. Marketing ROI is now a common concept: this collection proves to do the same for pricing. Hinterhuber & Liozu introduce the concept of pricing ROI, documenting and quantifying the return on pricing activities and on the pricing function itself is of increasing relevance today and in the future - in times of budget constraints. 20 world class specialists explore the concept of pricing ROI under both a theoretical perspective and a managerial perspective to shed much-needed light on how to measure and increase pricing ROI. This groundbreaking book will enlighten students and specialists of marketing and sales, pricing managers and executives alike.

Contemporary consumer society is increasingly saturated by digital technology, and the devices that deliver this are increasingly transforming consumption patterns. Social media, smartphones, mobile apps and digital retailing merge with traditional consumption spheres, supported by digital devices which further encourage consumers to communicate and influence other consumers to consume. Through a wide range of empirical studies which analyse the impact of digital devices, this volume explores the digitization of consumption and shows how consumer culture and consumption practices are fundamentally intertwined and mediated by digital devices. Exploring the development of new consumer cultures, leading international scholars from sociology, marketing and ethnology examine the effects on practices of consumption and marketing, through topics including big data, digital traces, streaming services, wearables, and social media's impact on ethical consumption. Digitalizing Consumption makes an important contribution to practice-based approaches to consumption, particularly the use of market devices in consumers' everyday consumer life, and will be of interest to scholars of marketing, cultural studies, consumer research, organization and management.

This book offers a unique analysis of how our definitions of luxury have changed over the ages, and with that the role and actions of both suppliers and buyers of luxury products. It traces the way luxury was seen as avarice and emblematic of morally corrosive behavior in past societies, to being viewed in more virtuous terms as the inevitable outcome of structural changes that legitimize the acquisition and display of wealth. It examines the origins of the shift from criticism to acceptance, and traces these changes to fundamentally different notions of what constitutes the basis for social order. Whereas pre-industrial hierarchies cloaked inequality in various secular and sacred guises to mitigate its presence, capitalism justified and reified inequality as a measure of individual success and initiative through interdependent market behavior. The result of this transformation is that status markers have become aspirational tools as hierarchies became porous and self-identity less ascriptive. Correspondingly, as demand for luxury became legitimized, the supply side underwent dramatic changes. Such changes are explored fully in the sectors of fashion, art and wine. As demand for high priced and scarce goods in each of these sectors has increased, in each case key actors have manipulated markets to purposefully either consolidate their pre-eminence or manufacture the requisite scarcity that affords them canonical status. The demand for and supply of luxury goods is now global; consumers seeking validation and affirmation of their status whilst producers engineer scarcity. Luxury is seen not only as good; it is virtuous, its demand possibly insatiable and extremely profitable.

This book comprehensively investigates the challenges to Myanmar's access to the global market. Myanmar is a late entrant in the global trade and investment scenario after years of isolation. However, it has large untapped potentials for trade and investment in minerals, agro and forest based industries, other labour intensive industries, services like tourism, IT, etc. Different chapters of the book explore the implication of democratic transition of Myanmar, the progress of Myanmar's industry and infrastructure, its international linkages and feasible options for integrating more in regional economic groups and also analyses how far Myanmar could exploit the global value chain. Although a number of reports have discussed sector specific prospects of Myanmar, this book is an authoritative work on these aspects for policy planners, academicians, researchers as well as potential investors.

The TPP was negotiated among 12 economically diverse countries, including some most highly developed and rich countries (i.e., the United States, Japan, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and Singapore), some newly industrialized countries (i.e., Mexico and Malaysia), and some less-developed countries (i.e., Peru, Chile, and Vietnam). A new paradigm created in this context is that countries with vastly different economic developments can actually agree on a set of very high standards to regulate their economic activities, to liberalize their trade, and to protect intellectual property and foreign investment. The contents of the TPP also reflect its status of being a "new paradigm" as the "21st-Century Trade Agreement" and being a pioneer in rule making in many key regulatory areas. These include not only the improved and enhanced rules on traditional issues already covered by the WTO , such as goods, services, and IP rights, but also the carefully designed rules in areas that have never been addressed in the WTO or comprehensively covered in other FTAs , such as state-owned enterprises, electronic commerce, and labor and environmental issues. Although the United States has withdrawn from the TPP, the remaining countries are still putting efforts into establishing a TPP without the United States or a TPP with China. Economically speaking, the current 11 parties account for about 20 % of the global economy. If such agreement is put into force, there will be significant implications for the region, for the multilateral system, and even for other FTAs. The book addresses the potential of the TPP to change the ways trade and investments are conducted and argues for its potential to be the start of an international trade/economic law revolution. The book elaborates the relationship between the TPP and other existing trade agreements such as the WTO and other FTAs and explains how the TPP is to deal with traditional and new issues. Taken together, the authors argue that the implications of the TPP go beyond its current membership. It is hoped that the book will make an important contribution to the field of international economic law.

Retail is going through difficult times and is suffering the consequences of both the economic crisis and the digitization of society. Fundamentally, there is a bigger problem: stores cannot keep up with the changing behavior of customers who are connected 24/7, customers for whom there is no distinction between online and offline.The End of Online Shopping: The Future of New Retail in an Always Connected World describes how the smart, the sharing, the circular, and the platform economy are shaping a new era of always connected retail. Retailers urgently need to innovate if they want to stay relevant in a world dominated by marketplaces and sharing platforms. The book contains inspiring examples from different industries - which include the usual suspects such as Amazon, Alibaba, and Google, but also local startups - and covers all aspects of the customer journey, from orientation and selection to delivery.The End of Online Shopping provides an excellent overview of shopping trends and developments worldwide, and offers readers indispensable insights into the future of retail.

Amazon - one of the world's most valuable companies - is worth more than Walmart, Netflix, Target, Nike and Costco combined. What are the secrets to its success? How can these insights be applied to other businesses in the e-commerce sector? The retail industry is facing unprecedented challenges. Across all sectors and markets, retailers are shifting their business models and customer engagement strategies to ensure they survive. Amazon offers unique insight into the company's persistent dissatisfaction with the status quo and innovation and how it has fundamentally changed the ways in which we shop. This fully updated second edition explores Amazon's response to the coronavirus pandemic, the convergence of physical and digital retail, e-commerce economics and sustainability, as well as future policy implications. Written by industry-leading retail analysts and with the first edition now translated into more than a dozen languages, Amazon is an invaluable resource for discovering the lessons that can be learned from the company's unprecedented rise to dominance.