Commodities - Publications - Faculty & Research

20 Apr 2010
First Look

First Look: April 20

Working Papers Commodity Chains: What Can We Learn from a Business History of the Rubber Chain? (1870-1910) Author: Felipe Tâmega Fernandes Abstract The literature on the rubber boom applied a dependendist view of rubber production in the... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

August 2017 (Revised March 2020)
Case

Flex Hungary: Launching Production (A)

By: Willy Shih

This case examines design choices in the construction of flow lines. Flow lines are a popular way of arranging production because they are simple and inherently efficient. Equipment or workstations are arranged according to the sequence of steps in which a product is... View Details

Keywords: Manufacturing; Line-balancing; Flow Line; Conveyor-paced Line; Consumer Goods; Consumer Products; Production Management; Production Planning; Production Scheduling; Operations; Production; Management; Supply Chain; Design; Analysis; Goods and Commodities; Consumer Products Industry; Manufacturing Industry; European Union

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February 1969
Article

Test of a Product Cycle Model of International Trade: U.S. Exports of Consumer Durables

By: Louis T Wells Jr

Keywords: Global Range; Trade; Product; Goods and Commodities; United States

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Web

Buy Now, Pay Later: Pre-Industrial Credit in Practice

possessed a commodity that a creditor wanted. 9 6 Quoted in Stewart Hall Holbrook, Machines of Plenty; Pioneering in American Agriculture (New York: Macmillan, 1955), 36. 7 Joseph Albert Ernst, Money and Politics in America, 1755-1775: A... View Details

March 2021
Article

Targeted Price Controls on Supermarket Products

By: Alberto Cavallo and Diego Aparicio

We study the impact of targeted price controls for supermarket products in Argentina from 2007 to 2015. Using web scraping, we collected daily prices for controlled and non-controlled goods and measured the differential effects on inflation, product availability, and... View Details

Keywords: Prices; Controls; Price Dispersion; Economics; Price; Cost Management; Goods and Commodities; Retail Industry; Argentina

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23 Mar 2016
News

Building a Biotech Business from Farmed Fish

plasma. “Now, what could you create out of that? So many medical products, which really could make a difference. “The thing that we’re trying to do is, on the margins, take a commodity business—growing salmon—and interact with... View Details

18 May 2011
News

Man with a Plan

the commodity wood segment. The Yella Fella character really came from the natural evolution of our advertising strategy. “Had you asked me in the mid-1980s if I envisioned playing a cowboy character in our commercials, I would never have... View Details

August 2022
Supplement

Sweet Teez Bakery: Projecting the Dough’s Rise Financial Supplement

By: Emily R. McComb, Mel Martin and Amy Klopfenstein

Abstract: In 2021, the HBS Impact Investment Fund student team met with entrepreneur Teresa Maynard, who had applied for a $25,000 impact investment loan. The students thought the former Harvard Data Scientist’s bakery business, Sweet Teez Bakery, showed promise.... View Details

Keywords: Impact Investment; Entrepreneurship; Social Entrepreneurship; Finance; Investment; Goods and Commodities; Financial Reporting; Small Business; Food and Beverage Industry; Massachusetts; United States

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July 2008
Case

Aurora Capital Group - Douglas Dynamics

Aurora Capital, a U.S. Private Equity firm, contemplates whether to acquire Douglas Dynamics, the leading U.S. maker of snow plows. Does a business that is highly dependent on the weather, and is seasonal, make a good LBO candidate? This case provides a good... View Details

Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Private Equity; Investment; Goods and Commodities; Value Creation

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November 2014
Teaching Note

Marketing Marijuana in Colorado

By: John A. Quelch

The case, set in the middle of 2014, reviews the first six months of marketplace activity in Colorado, following the legalization of marijuana for recreational use and the expansion of marijuana retailing from medical dispensaries to recreational stores. The case... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Innovations; Retail Government Services; Public Health; Agribusiness; Customers; Goods and Commodities; Government and Politics; Health; Marketing; Society; Consumer Products Industry; Distribution Industry; Health Industry; Public Administration Industry; North and Central America

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15 Mar 2018
Working Paper Summaries

Targeted Price Controls on Supermarket Products

Keywords: by Alberto Cavallo and Diego Aparicio; Food & Beverage

December 2013
Case

Grupo Beta San Miguel

By: David E. Bell and Natalie Kindred

In November 2013, Dr. Jose Pinto, head of Grupo Beta San Miguel (BSM), Mexico's largest private sugar producer, is weighing the future prospects of the Mexican sugar industry as he considers whether BSM should bid on one of the state-owned sugar mills slated for... View Details

Keywords: Mexico; Jose Pinto; Beta San Miguel; Polycrom; Sugar; World Sugar Trade; NAFTA; Strategy; Trade; Futures and Commodity Futures; Agribusiness; Price; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Mexico; United States; North America

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22 Sep 2021
Blog Post

Student Spotlight: Jesse Lou (MBA 2022) – Working to Change the Food System

oils, using a lot less land and resources. It’s no secret that these are powerful organisms, but past attempts to scale production have faced challenging unit economics (high up-front capital costs for facilities, selling into commodity... View Details

Fast Answer

FIELD Global Immersion Resources: Taiwan

keyword and geography keywords in search (ex: commodities Taiwan). Search tips: use concise keywords. Go to "Analysis" section for full industry reports; Go to "Consumers" section to brows reports on... View Details

15 Sep 2003
Research & Ideas

The Lessons of New-Market Disruption

very inexpensive commodity components that perform basic computations in household appliances, like irons and toasters. At the time, microcontroller manufacturers were just beginning to use automated test equipment. Although the... View Details

Keywords: by Clark Gilbert; Technology

Fast Answer

Bloomberg: keyboard

windows; double click on a panel to resize screen. PFD Yellow Preferred Shares EQUITY Yellow Equity Shares CMDTY Yellow Commodity Markets INDEX Yellow Indexes CRNCY Yellow Currency Markets PgUp/PgDn Green Moves up and down through... View Details

01 Mar 2008
News

Faculty Research Online

globalization of medical services? Q&A with Professor Tarun Khanna. Visit http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/5814.html. When Your Product Becomes a Commodity Like death and taxes, commoditization of your products is a given. Professor John Quelch... View Details

Keywords: Ambulatory Health Care Services; Health, Social Assistance; Management

03 Nov 2008
HBS Case

Economics of the Ethanol Business

10,000 bushels of corn annually. For the farmers, MME offers a potential hedge against the volatility of commodity prices and the hope of a more stable future for their children. "This is also a fascinating entrepreneurial... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Agriculture & Agribusiness; Energy

01 Sep 2008
News

Farming for Fuel

2003, the group fans out to test the idea with some 2,500 farmers in the area; after this outreach, MME has 729 members willing to make the minimum investment of $20,000 and 10,000 bushels of corn annually. For the farmers, MME offers a potential hedge against the... View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; Animal Production and Aquaculture; Agriculture; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services