Editorial

Citation

Fernie, J. (2008), "Editorial", International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, Vol. 36 No. 6. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijrdm.2008.08936faa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, Volume 36, Issue 6

Our current issue covers a range of issues from authors from Canada, Spain, Germany and Finland. The first paper is by Harold Boeck and Samuel Wamba from Quebec in Canada. They explore relationships in a retail supply chain involving ten companies and three manufacturers, four distributors and three retailers involved in the supply of a bottled beverage. Members of the chain were implementing RFID and the authors carried out semi-structured interviews and participant observation to assess the interplay of relationships. It was shown that RFID implementation has led to co-operation to improve supply efficiency yet not without question marks over power and trust issues between partners.

Peter Kenning continues this theme on trust in a consumer behaviour context. Using the ITS-Rotter scale for measuring general trust, he surveys around 330 consumers from six supermarket chains in Germany. Not surprisingly, the results show that general as well as specific trust affects buying behaviour.

The next two papers are contributions from Spanish authors. Eva Martinez and Teresa Montaner discuss the characteristics of buyers of store brands in Spain – more specifically food and cleaning products in Zaragoza. From a survey of 425 consumers, it was difficult to identify any relationship between store brand consumers and their demographic characteristics. Such consumers are loyal to their stores, price sensitive, time-pressured and attach little importance to quality. Maria Martinez-Ruiz and Alejandro Mollá-Descals also carried out research on Spanish grocery retailing. Their research focuses on assessing the impact of temporary retail price discounts. Using data on daily sales from scanning equipment of a Spanish grocery chain over one year, the authors focused on three general product categories – packaged wine, milk and coffee. The results show that these price reductions increase brand sales of the promoted brands with some brands gaining sales at the expense of substituted items and from sales of competing items.

Our final paper from Arto Lindblom, Rami Olkkonen and Lasse Mitronen discusses the cognitive styles of retail entrepreneurs belonging to the K-alliance of Finland. Results from the 226 retailers contacted show that these retailers behave more like salaried managers rather than entrepreneurs and that there was no relationship between the styles of these “entrepreneurs” and their business performance.

John Fernie