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Retail Industry (retail + industry)
Kinds of Retail Industry Selected AbstractsA Note on the Geographic Interdependencies of Retail Market AreasJOURNAL OF REGIONAL SCIENCE, Issue 1 2002David Mushinski Central place theory describes an orderly hierarchy of places, with particular retail services developing for lower-ordered places as they reach a threshold. Yet it is likely that nearby areas could serve simultaneously as a source of demand and a source of competing supply for retail stores in a place. This paper contributes to the understanding of local economic development by modeling and estimating the geographic interdependence between a place and its neighboring areas. The simultaneous equation Tobit results suggest that such geographical interdependence exists for most retail industries, with spatial competition on the supply side being particularly important. [source] Hazardous task recognition among U.S. adolescents working in the retail or service industryAMERICAN JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL MEDICINE, Issue 7 2010Catherine J. Vladutiu MPH Abstract Background Although the hazardous tasks adolescent workers perform in service and retail industries are well documented, little is known about the extent to which young workers recognize these tasks as hazardous or dangerous. Methods Using data from a nationally representative cross-sectional telephone survey conducted in 2003, we examined hazardous task recognition among 858 adolescents working in the retail or service industry. Results Approximately 13% (n,=,123) of respondents reported that they consider at least one of their job tasks to be hazardous or dangerous. Among the respondents who performed tasks known to be hazardous, very few actually recognized these tasks as being hazardous or dangerous. Conclusion Working adolescents appear to underestimate the dangers associated with work, thus increasing the potential likelihood of injury. Emphasis should be placed on eliminating or reducing hazards in the workplace while simultaneously improving young workers' recognition of the hazardous nature of many of the tasks they perform. Am. J. Ind. Med. 53:686,692, 2010. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Price Competition, Business Hours and Shopping Time Flexibility,THE ECONOMIC JOURNAL, Issue 531 2008Oz Shy We analyse retail industries with two-stage competition in opening hours and prices. We explore the effects of consumers' shopping time flexibility by comparing bi-directional consumers with forward- or backward-oriented consumers, who can either postpone or advance their shopping, but not both. We demonstrate that retailers with longer opening hours charge higher prices and that opening hour differentiation softens price competition. We show that competition does not create incentives for retailers to expand their business hours beyond social optimum. In this respect our model does not justify restrictions on shopping hours. [source] Seeing sustainability in business operations: US and British food retailer experiments with accountabilityBUSINESS STRATEGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT, Issue 4 2007Alastair Iles Abstract This article compares how food retail industries in Britain and the United States are facing sustainability challenges. The British and US industries are in different stages of maturity in identifying and responding to sustainability. Some UK retailers have begun developing broad-based accountability systems that may aid them to see sustainability in their business operations. By examining what retailers are doing, how accountability systems can inform retailers and the business case for accountability, this article argues that retailers can gain significant business advantages with strategies to improve accountability. Compared with their American counterparts, British retailers may be better placed to deal with sustainability issues in future. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source] Organizational Challenges and Strategic Responses of Retail TNCs in Post-WTO-Entry ChinaECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 1 2009Wance Tacconelli abstract In the context of a market characterized by the enduring legacy of socialism through governmental ownership of retail businesses, the continued presence of domestic retailers, and increasing levels of competition, this article examines the organizational challenges faced by, and the strategic responses adopted by, a group of leading food and general merchandise retail transnational corporations (TNCs) in developing networks of stores in the post-WTO-entry Chinese market. On the basis of extensive interview-based fieldwork conducted in China from 2006 to 2008, the article details the attempts of these retail TNCs to embed their operations in Chinese logistics and supply networks, real estate markets, and consumer cultures,three dimensions that are fundamental to the achievement of market competitiveness by the retail TNCs. The article illustrates how this process of territorial embeddedness presents major challenges for the retail TNCs and how their strategic responses vary substantially, indicating different routes to the achievement of organizational legitimacy in China. The article concludes by offering an analysis of the various strategic responses of the retail TNCs and by suggesting some future research propositions on the globalization of the retail industry. [source] E-commerce, Transportation, and Economic GeographyGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 4 2003William P. Anderson ABSTRACT This paper explores possible ways in which growth in Internet retailing (e-retailing) may affect the spatial distribution of economic activities. After a brief overview of e-retailing, a categorization of possible spatial impacts is introduced. These include impacts on the retail industry, such as substitution of e-retail for brick-and-mortar retail, impacts on transportation, such as substitution of freight transportation for personal transportation in goods delivery, and pervasive impacts that affect the whole economy. The latter category includes uniform delivered pricing, spatial leveling of accessibility, and marketing strategies that target individuals rather than regions. The question of whether e-retailing and brick-and-mortar retailing are truly substitutes is taken up in the next section, along with potential implications of multi-channel retailing. The final section of the paper defines some critical research directions. [source] Measuring Market Power for Food Retail Activities: French EvidenceJOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 2 2000Alexandre Gohin In this paper we develop and estimate an empirical model of pricing behaviour for food retail firms in both a quantity-setting oligopoly engaged in the joint production of demand-related final goods and a quantity-setting oligopsony for supply-unrelated wholesale goods. The procedure consists of estimating an inverse demand system for the final goods, single supply functions for the wholesale goods and the retail industry first-order profit-maximisation conditions, from which an estimate of the degree of imperfect competition and of oligopoly-oligopsony power for the different commodities can be retrieved. The model is applied to the French food retail industry and three commodities are distinguished: dairy products, meat products and other food products. We strongly reject the hypothesis that French food retail firms behave competitively, and more than 20 and 17 per cent of the wholesale-to-retail price margins for dairy products and meat products, respectively, can be attributed to oligopoly-oligopsony distortions. [source] The consolidation wave in U.S. food retailing: A European perspectiveAGRIBUSINESS : AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL, Issue 4 2001Neil Wrigley This article assesses, from the perspective of a European academic, the intense wave of acquisition and merger driven consolidation that swept through the U.S. food retail industry during the late 1990s. It reviews the characteristics and causes of that consolidation wave, placing emphasis on the regulatory history of the industry, the consequences of its financial reengineering during the 1980s, and the link between Wal-Mart's entry into the industry and the consolidation wave. The article then assesses the extent to which a shift in regulatory policy and practice by the Federal Trade Commission at the very end of the decade may have altered the pattern and scale of consolidation in the industry. Finally, it considers the future landscape of U.S. food retail consolidation, debating the consequences for the consolidation process of the period of FTC regulatory tightening during 1999/2000 and the likely implications of a Bush administration appointee heading the FTC [EconLit Classifications: L810, L190, G340, L400]. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [source] Packaging handling evaluation methods in the grocery retail industryPACKAGING TECHNOLOGY AND SCIENCE, Issue 1 2001Mazen Saghir Abstract The grocery retail industry, with its large product volumes, low margins and fierce competition, is constantly seeking efficiency improvements in its supply chain. The grocery retail industry uses an immense amount of packaging and is directly affected by packaging logistics activities. There is, therefore, a potential for efficiency improvements in the grocery retail supply chain through the integration and development of new systems of packaging and logistics. Packaging handling is identified as one of the main activities that has a strong impact on the overall logistical cost of a grocery chain. This research article investigates packaging handling evaluation methods and discusses how these are employed to benefit the industry. Case studies, involving six major companies from the Swedish grocery retail industry, have been used to evaluate packaging and logistics activities. This work, together with a literature review, was used to identify the need for evaluative methods and the present availability of such methods. The results indicated a lack of sufficient and usable packaging handling evaluation methods in today's grocery and packaging industry especially from a logistical point of view. The paper also highlights the lack of systematization among the few methods used and discusses how these can be used to build a systematic and multifunctional evaluation model in order to utilize the information from different studies to build a knowledge base for the future. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Retail Mergers, Buyer Power and Product Variety,THE ECONOMIC JOURNAL, Issue 516 2007Roman Inderst This article analyses the impact of retail mergers on product variety. We show that, following a merger, a retailer may want to enhance its buyer power by committing to a ,single-sourcing' purchasing strategy. Anticipating further concentration in the retail industry, suppliers will strategically choose to produce less differentiated products, which further reduces product variety. If negotiations are efficient, the overall loss in product variety may reduce consumer surplus and total welfare. With linear tariffs, however, there may be a countervailing effect as the more powerful retailer passes on lower prices to final consumers. [source] Female Part-time Workers' Attitudes to Trade Unions in BritainBRITISH JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, Issue 1 2002Sally Walters This paper discusses the reasons that can be offered for the lower trade union membership rates of female part-time workers in the UK and focuses in particular on female part-timers' attitudes to trade unions. The findings are based on original research: 50 qualitative interviews with female part-time workers in the retail industry. The paper argues that female part-timers are supportive of the aims of the trade union movement and concludes that an integrated approach is necessary in order to understand part-timers' unionization rates. This includes structural factors, the approach that trade unions have taken towards part-time workers and attitudes towards trade unions. [source] From Insurrectionary Worker to Contingent Citizen: restructuring labor markets and repositioning East Rand (South Africa) retail sector workersCITY & SOCIETY, Issue 1 2003Bridget Kenny Cities in South Africa, engineered as they were through apartheid, have fundamentally defined experiences of work, residence, leisure, and collective organization of urban and rural dwellers alike. Within the distinctive spaces of urban centers, citizens encounter the more recent difficulties of global economic restructuring as well as the potential to create their own opposition to increased marginalization. Using workplace interviews and life histories conducted from 1998-2000 of retail sector workers on the East Rand, South Africa, this paper focuses on the changing "local labor market." From a focal point of an organized, democratic union movement linked to community anti-apartheid struggles, more recently the region has undergone de-industrialization exacerbated by increasing "flexibilized" service employment and directed investment to other centers, like Johannesburg's rapidly developing north. The article explores how East Rand worker-residents experience an increasingly contingent labor market through shifting identities as workers and as men and women. [South Africa, retail industry, East Rand, deindustrialization, labor markets, gender, globalization] [source] Innovations in the Development and Application of Edible Coatings for Fresh and Minimally Processed Fruits and VegetablesCOMPREHENSIVE REVIEWS IN FOOD SCIENCE AND FOOD SAFETY, Issue 3 2007Daniel Lin ABSTRACT:, One of the major growth segments in the food retail industry is fresh and minimally processed fruits and vegetables. This new market trend has thus increased the demands to the food industry for seeking new strategies to increase storability and shelf life and to enhance microbial safety of fresh produce. The technology of edible coatings has been considered as one of the potential approaches for meeting this demand. Edible coatings from renewable sources, including lipids, polysaccharides, and proteins, can function as barriers to water vapor, gases, and other solutes and also as carriers of many functional ingredients, such as antimicrobial and antioxidant agents, thus enhancing quality and extending shelf life of fresh and minimally processed fruits and vegetables. This review discusses the rationale of using edible coatings on fresh and minimally processed produce, the challenges in developing effective coatings that meet the specific criteria of fruits and vegetables, the recent advances in the development of coating technology, the analytical techniques for measuring some important coating functionalities, and future research needs for supporting a broad range of commercial applications. [source] | |||||||||||||