This book covers significant recent developments in the field of Intelligent Meth ods applied to eCommerce. The Intelligent Methods considered are mainly Soft Computing Methods that include fuzzy sets, rough sets, neural networks, evolutionary computations, probabilistic and evidential reasoning, multivalued logic, and related fields. There is not doubt about the relevance of eCommerce in our daily environ ments and in the work carried out at many research centers throughout the world. The application of AI to Commerce is growing as fast as the computers and net works are being integrated in all business and commerce aspects. We felt that it was time to sit down and see how was the impact into that field of low-level AI, i.e. softcomputing. We found many scattered contributions disseminated in con ferences, workshops, journal, books or even technical reports, but nothing like a common framework that could serve as a basis for further research, comparison or even prototyping for a direct transfer to the industry. We felt then the need to set up a reference point, a book like this. We planned this book as a recompilation of the newest developments of re searchers who already made some contribution into the field. The authors were se lected based on the originality and quality of their work and its relevance to the field. Authors came from prestigious universities and research centers with differ ent backgrounds."

This detailed study is the first exploration of rural consumption of clothing in early nineteenth-century Britain. Drawing on evidence from a range of sources including newspapers, trade directories, court records, visual sources and surviving garments, Toplis investigates how the apparel of the mass of the British population was acquired.

In Retail and Social Change Steven Miles, presents a cross-disciplinary analysis of the evolution of retail and how in both its material and virtual guises it has come to reframe our relationship with the social world. Retail has become increasingly influential in homogenising the urban experience. And yet in reacting to trends in virtual consumption retailers are also becoming more and more conscious of the need to engage with consumers in more sophisticated ways. Retail and Social Change will interest students and scholars in geography, cultural studies, sociology, marketing and business studies interested in how and why retail pervades both our physical and emotional lives in increasingly unexpected ways. It will provide a lively, comparative and thought-provoking contribution that interrogates the implications of retail change, for what it means to be a citizen of a consumer society in the twenty-first century.

The book is made distinctive by the presentation of practitioner insight allied with academic underpinning to create a powerful new framework of unusual breadth and depth. The book communicates contemporary retail thought from the perspectives of both senior international retailers and expert observers. It is structured around four sections: * Section I : retailing in an international context * Section II: chapters from faculty at Templeton College in Oxford outlining the key issues with review questions, discussion topics, assignments and further reading. * Section III : A unique series of in depth interviews with senior executives in the world's major retailers conducted by the Oxford Institute of Retail Management. Each case is backed up by company and sector information to demonstrate the changing retail and global environment. * Section IV: A summary and overview with further exercises assignments and recommended reading.The book is an innovative and highly effective new text for both students and executives needing to understand the complexities of the latest global developments and thinking.

This path-breaking collection, edited by two leading scholars in the field, brings together seminal contributions from the burgeoning multidisciplinary literature on the globalization of retailing. In addition to focusing on the retail corporations and their expansionary strategies, it explores the multi-faceted impacts of retail globalization on host economies and profiles the store and sourcing dimensions of transnational retail activity.These volumes are of particular interest to scholars in management and business studies, economic geography, development studies and economics, and more generally to all social scientists interested in the transformative role of retailing within the global economy.

Most marketing scholars implicitly consider independent merchants as conservative and passive actors, and study the modernization of retailing via department stores, chains and supermarkets. In this innovative study, Franck Cochoy challenges this perspective and takes a close look at the transformation of commerce through the lens of Progressive Grocer, an American trade magazine launched in 1922. Aimed at modernizing small independent grocery stores, Progressive Grocer sowed the seeds for modern self-service which spread in small retail outlets, sometimes well before the advent of the large retail spaces which are traditionally viewed as the origin of the self-service economy. The author illustrates how this publication had a highly influential role on what the trade considered to be best practice and shaped what was considered to be cutting edge. By displacing the consumer and their agency from the centre of analytic attention, this innovative book highlights the complex impact of social, technical and retailing environment factors that structure and delimit consumer freedom in the marketplace. This detailed critical analysis of the origins of self-service will be of interest to a wide variety of scholars not only in marketing and consumer research, but also in business history, sociology and cultural studies.

Electronic Commerce Management for Business Activities and Global Enterprises: Competitive Advantages is written as an e-commerce textbook for undergraduate and graduate students in various business programs, including information systems, marketing, computer science, and MBA. In addition to serving as a textbook in e-commerce, this book also provides an excellent repository for instructors, researchers, and industry practitioners for their research ideas, theories, and practical experiences. In addition to regular topics traditionally taught in the classroom, this textbook addresses the many new emerging ideas and applications and presents tools and techniques in all aspects of e-commerce development and management in the global economy.

'Retail Marketing Management covers all the essential theories needed to understand the complicated business of retail: from understanding the consumer and purchasing of the product through to store layout and communications. The writing style is easy to follow, and the text is supported by diagrams and case studies which enhance understanding and learning. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn more about the retail business.' Nicole Dunlop, Course Director, London College of Fashion, UK Retail Marketing offers a contemporary approach that combines retail marketing theory, current retail management practice and international examples. It begins by looking at the nature of retailing as an activity and then introduces retail marketing, followed by a discussion of consumer behaviour, the retail marketing mix, and other important issues such as location strategies, branding and ethics. The authors and expert contributors take an integrated approach to explaining the process of internationalisation, and the inclusion of international examples reinforces this approach. The book is ideal for undergraduate and postgraduate students taking courses in retailing, as well as those studying for marketing and business degrees where retail marketing is a core module. The blend of retail theory, practice and live examples will also be of interest to practitioners in retailing and related industries. Key features Case studies and seminar discussion questions in every chapter Chapters and vignettes by expert contributors with a combination of academic and industry experience Retail practitioner cases which emphasise practical aspects as well as key theories in retail marketing New models that help to visualise interactions between marketing environments, retail marketing management decisions, and shopper behaviour Related online materials, including powerpoint slides About the authors Helen Goworek lectures in the School of Management at the University of Leicester, where she teaches postgraduate modules in marketing, including 'B2B Marketing and Supply Chain Management'. She is the author of two previous books about the fashion business, in addition to journal articles focusing on fashion buying and sustainability. Dr Peter McGoldrick has held four professorial posts in retailing, and is currently at the University of Manchester, UK. He has published several books and over 150 research papers and articles, which have appeared in the Journal of Retailing and Harvard Business Review, among others. Best Paper awards include those at the World Marketing Congress and the 2014 Academy of Marketing Science.

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.

China's new retail revolution will completely transform how the world thinks about retail and digital innovation. But is the world ready yet? In this book, the authors share an insider's perspective on what is happening in China to reveal the future for global retail, and a clear framework to help you prepare. The book presents a number of real-world cases, based on interviews and first-hand consumer experience, to decode China's retail revolution so that you can understand what is happening and why, and what it means for the rest of the world. Crucially, the book identifies five critical stages in the development of new retail that global retail executives need to grasp now: lifestyle commerce, Online-Merge-Offline retail, social retail, livestream retail and invisible retail. To help the industry get ready for this new, China-inspired paradigm in retail, the authors present a practical and simple framework - a ten-year strategic roadmap for global retail executives, which we call the "Beyond" the Value Chain Model. China's new retail is not just about fashion, cosmetics, snacks, data-driven convenient stores and commercial live streaming. At a time when the world of retail is being upended, it offers inspirational lessons in innovation, purpose and agility for global executives across the entire retail spectrum.

This book explores ways to drive and increase a brand's most important property, its equity. Focussing on gender, the author analyses the impact of assigning personalities and characteristics to products and how this can affect the management of brands on a global scale. Using detailed examples, the author argues that brands with low masculine and feminine characteristics have the lowest equity, whilst brands with both high feminine and masculine characteristics are shown to have the strongest equity. Including notions of androgyny in brands, this significant study reveals the different factors which can affect a brand being perceived as either masculine or feminine. Aiming to develop a comprehensive theory and provide practitioners with a guide to increasing the equity of their brands, this controversial and pioneering book lays the foundation for creating a global brand personality model.

First published in 1998.This is Volume XIV of the eighteen in the Sociology of Work and Organization series and which is an investigation of the developments of combination in the distributive trades, with special emphasis upon wartime development, looking at a new form monopolist organisation in Britain which was initially a report to the Fabian Society in 1942

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.

Retail is the essential link between production and consumption. The dynamics of a nation's economy cannot be fully understood without a good understanding of its retail sector. This book is written to achieve three broad objectives. First, it provides a comprehensive assessment of the changes in consumption patterns in China, the current size of the Chinese consumer market, and the regional variations. Second, it presents an interpretation of the changes in the country's regulatory system and the corresponding policy initiatives, including the new state spatial strategies devised after its admission to the WTO. Third, it delivers a systematic analysis of the transformation of China's retail sector. This includes the entry and expansion of foreign retailers, the development of indigenous retail chains as a national strategy to modernize China's retail industry, and the changing retailer-supplier relations. This book is a useful reference not only for university students and faculty researchers, but also for international retailers and commercial real estate developers who contemplate business and investment opportunities in China.

Innovative tourism industry leader Rosemary Rice McCormick guides the reader through the basics of marketing and tourism know-how for museum store managers and other museum and heritage marketing professionals. Packed with valuable ideas and case studies, you will learn how to build your business in the fast-growing, global tourism market, increase museum visitation and museum store sales, leverage business partnerships and tap into that "drive market" that comprises 85% of US travelers. This valuable resource is a must for all those in the business of connecting people with the cultural wealth of our museums and parks. The book received a 2011 SASI-ONE Gold Award from the Shop America Alliance.

Retailing in the countries of Asia Pacific is changing dramatically. Changes which took decades, even centuries, elsewhere are happening in a few years. The growth of larger firms and the arrival of international retailers are changing the business landscape, bringing the consistent supply and presentation of wider ranges of goods to consumers, and leading to the development of new kinds of retail stores and modern shopping malls, often in new locations. All of these developments are important for economic growth and for consumers and their lifestyles, They raise questions for governments about foreign investment, about social and environmental change, and about the fate of traditional retailers. This book examines the trends, seeking to understand how far they are global and how local circumstances affect developments. International retailers have spread across the region, but not always successfully. Studies in several countries look at their processes of growth and some of the reasons for success and failure. A review of changing regulation across the region suggests regulators should be concerned to avoid the problems of overconcentration of retail power, and country studies reflect on the effects of regulation as well as cultural and other influences on change.

This book was published as a special issue of Asia Pacific Business Review.

Addressing the current dearth of available literature on this topic, the editors use a range of international case studies to explore street vending and informal economies which continue to be, especially in developing countries, a vital economic driver. This volume collects essays from authors around the world about the markets and vendors they know best, including studies of USA, China, Mexico, Turkey. The contributors speak of the struggles that vendors have faced to legitimize their activity, the role that they play in helping societies adapt to and survive catastrophes as well as the practical roles that they play in both the local and global social and economic system. As well as highlighting the importance of street markets as a phenomenon of interest in itself to a growing body of scholarship, this study demonstrates how an analysis of street vending can provide insights not only into economic anthropology, but also urban studies, post modernism, spatial geography, political sociology and globalization theory.

An examination of the relationship between competition and the deregulation and liberalisation of the US and European air transport sectors reveals that the structure of the air transport sector has undergone a number of significant changes. A growing number of airlines are entering into horizontal and vertical cooperative arrangements and integration including franchising, codeshare agreements, alliances, 'virtual mergers' and in some cases, mergers with other airlines, groups of airlines or other complementary lines of business such as airports. This book considers the current legal issues affecting the air transport sector incorporating recent developments in the industry, including the end of certain exemptions from EU competition rules, the effect of the EU-US Open Skies Agreement, the accession of new EU Member States and the Lisbon Treaty. The book explores the differing European and US regulatory approaches to the changes in the industry and examines how airlines have remained economically efficient in what is perceived as a complex and confused regulatory environment. Competition and Regulation in the Airline Industry will be of particular interest to academics and students of competition law as well as EU law.

The results of the 1959 Glasgow University investigation into British industrial profit, business saving, and investment are the subject of this book, originally published in 1965. Part 1 presents original estimates of profits in British industries 1920-1938, which when linked with Government estimates of such profits since 1948, permit long runs studies of the fortunes of individual industries. In addition, the appropriation of profit between dividends and business saving is also estimated for manufacturing industry 1920-1938. Part 2 begins the analysis of the extensive financial data collected in the Glasgow enquiry and is concerned with the effects of the size of a firm on its financial performance. The financial performance of large companies quoted on the Stock Exchange with a sample of small unquoted private companies and unincorporated firms is compared.

Originally published in 1968, this second volume of the Glasgow Studies in Profit, Business Saving and Investment uses the financial data assembled in Volume 1 to test economic theories of the factor distribution income, of the appropriation of profit, of the determinants of investment, and of the return on capital. The tests enabled the measurement of long-run and short-run variation of the ratio of profit to employee compensation in the United Kingdom at the level of individual industries and the whole industrial sector. As well as measuring the relationship between a company's sales or profits and its expenditure on fixed assets, the book describes the long-term decline in the rate of return on capital in the UK and measures the effect of the intensity of competition on this return.

For this authoritative collection, Mitchel Abolafia has chosen the most significant previously published papers and articles in the field of economic sociology, which contribute to an understanding of the organisation of markets. Economists are becoming increasingly aware of the institutional nature of markets, but to date, it is economic sociologists who have carried out much of the analytical work on real world market institutions. To develop our understanding of markets, the time is ripe for a fruitful dialogue across the disciplinary boundaries. Although economic sociologists recognize markets as mechanisms of exchange, they seem to be more concerned with how markets work, rather than with how well they work. The papers selected for this book are the result of empirical studies of particular markets, including markets in options, futures, currency, initial public offerings of stock, biotechnology, women's apparel, and auctions in a variety of commodities. They indicate an important research initiative to explore how markets really work. 19 articles, dating from 1963 to 2002

First Published in 1998. This is Volume XV of the eighteen in the Sociology of Work and Organization series and this book on The Shops of Britain follows the author's publication on Retail Trade Associations, a new form of monopolist organization in Britain. After the book had been completed, the Report of the Census of Distribution Committee, published in March 1946, urged the necessity of providing more statistical information about the distributive trades. One of the purposes of this book is to display how complex the structure of retailing is and to show that it is dependent on a great variety of economic, social, occupational and sociological factors which cannot be adequately assessed without a comparative analysis of all the various trades concerned with retailing.

For courses in Retail Buying, Retail Merchandising and Fashion Merchandising. Retail Buying, Ninth Edition, is known for its clear depiction of retail buying, reflecting what buyers face every day in their pursuit of excellence. Focusing on the changes in today's market, the book addresses topics such as diverse ethnicities and the nuances of purchasing abroad. Contemporary market considerations are highlighted throughout, including chapters on buying for discount operations, using the Internet for product procurement, and methods of analyzing customer demand. With a host of end-of-chapter materials and visual aids, this book continues its tradition of effectively preparing students for their role as professional retail buyers.

Logistics and supply chains play a vital role in the overall success of retail management. This fifth edition of Logistics and Retail Management covers the major strides made in retail logistics and the challenges which remain, providing students and professionals with the current thinking and research in this strategic field. Including chapters on internationalization, corporate social responsibility (CSR), and green logistics, the book also explores examples from successful organizations such as Schuh and Tesco. Fully updated with the latest international developments and on-going changes in the field, Logistics and Retail Management, 5th edition is a multi-contributed collection from leading academics and practitioners and an expert editor team. The new edition also includes material on the luxury fashion industry and the logistical challenges of e-commerce. Logistics and Retail Management, 5th edition is the essential text for students of retail logistics and supply chain management.

After World War II, structures, practices and the culture of retailing in most West European countries went through a period of rapid change. The post-war economic boom, the emergence of a mass consumer society, and the adaptation of innovations which already had been implemented in the USA during the interwar period, revolutionized the world of getting and spending. But the implementation of self-service and the supermarket, the spread of the department store and the mail order business were not only elements of a transatlantic catch up process of 'Americanization' of retailing. National patterns of the retail trade and specific cultures of consumption remained crucial, and long term processes of change, starting in the 1920s or 1930s, also had an impact on the transformation of retailing in post-war Europe. This volume presents a series of case-studies looking at transformations of retailing in several European countries, offering new insights into the structural preconditions of the emerging mass consumer societies and also into the consequences consumerism had on the practices of retailing.