Publications

May 2018
Case

Sagacity Tea: What Direction for Growth?

By: John A. Quelch and Amy Handlin

Kate Moran, CEO and cofounder of Sagacity Tea, a small, Vermont-based ready-to-drink tea brand, is considering a consumer-product group (CPG) broker's proposal for the product's launch in several cities along the East Coast of the United States. The commitments in the... View Details

Keywords: Product Launch; Marketing; Distribution; Growth Management; Marketing Channels; Decision Choices and Conditions

May 2018
Article

Effects of an Information Sharing System on Employee Creativity, Engagement, and Performance

By: Shelley Xin Li and Tatiana Sandino

Many service organizations rely on information sharing systems to boost employee creativity to meet customer needs. We conducted a field experiment in a retail chain, based on a registered report accepted by Journal of Accounting Research, to test whether an... View Details

Keywords: Information; Knowledge Sharing; Employees; Creativity; Performance

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April 2018
Supplement

Flipkart (B): The Ongoing Battle for India's E-Commerce Market

By: Sunil Gupta, Das Narayandas and Rachna Tahilyani

In 2017, both Flipkart and Amazon claimed leadership position in India's recently concluded key annual festive season sale, but it was too early to declare victory. Amazon continues to invest heavily in India. Competition from newer players is increasing. Media reports... View Details

Keywords: Digital Platforms; Internet and the Web; Competition; Retail Industry; India

April 2018 (Revised November 2019)
Case

JD: Envisioning the Future of Retail (A)

By: Feng Zhu and Shirley Sun

JD, China’s second largest e-commerce company by gross merchandise volume (GMV) after Alibaba, had expanded rapidly from 2012 to 2016. When the company celebrated its 13th birthday in 2017, Richard Liu, its founder, deliberated on the company’s growth strategies. The... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Competitive Strategy; E-commerce; Retail Industry; China

Article

Offline Showrooms in Omni-channel Retail: Demand and Operational Benefits

By: David R. Bell, Santiago Gallino and Antonio Moreno

Omnichannel environments where customers shop online and offline at the same retailer are ubiquitous and are deployed by online-first and traditional retailers alike. We focus on the relatively understudied domain of online-first retailers and the engagement of a key... View Details

Keywords: Experience Attributes; Marketing–operations Interface; Omnichannel Retailing; Quasi-experimental Methods; Retail Operations; Showrooms; Marketing Channels; Demand and Consumers; Performance Efficiency; Retail Industry

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Article

The Store Is Dead—Long Live the Store

By: David R. Bell, Santiago Gallino and Antonio Moreno

In this article, we pursue two interconnected themes: the expansion of online-first retailers into offline stores that serve the purpose of “supercharging” customer value, and the transformation of the stores of offline-first retailers from... View Details

Keywords: Customer Experience; Inventory Control; Omnichannel Retailing; Online Marketing; Marketing Channels; Trends; Transformation; Digital Marketing; Retail Industry

March 2018
Teaching Note

Mavi: Fashioning a Path to Brand Growth

By: Jill Avery and Gamze Yucaoglu

Mavi, a leading Turkish apparel retailer, had sales of $419 million in 2015, up 20%. Growth rates like these were becoming routine at Mavi. But, its path to growth was getting more challenging, and Turkven, Mavi’s private equity partner, was planning its exit options... View Details

Keywords: Retailing; Fashion; Brand; Brand Management; Brand Extension; Brand Equity; Private Equity; Marketing; Marketing Strategy; Brands and Branding; Growth and Development Strategy; Decision Choices and Conditions; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; Turkey; Europe

March 2018 (Revised September 2019)
Case

Chewy.com (A)

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport and Matthew G. Preble

In late 2013, Ryan Cohen, cofounder and CEO of online pet products retailer Chewy.com, faces a “bet the company decision”—whether to stay with a third-party logistics provider (3PL) for all of its e-commerce fulfillment or to take the function in house. Cohen worries... View Details

Keywords: Pet Food; Pet Products; Retail; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Operations; Decision Choices and Conditions; E-commerce; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; Florida; United States

March 2018
Supplement

Chewy.com (B)

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport and Matthew G. Preble

Cohen and Chewy’s other board members decided to fully insource order fulfilment and commenced building an order fulfilment center near its 3PL partner’s facility. As soon as the 3PL learned that Chewy would be managing its own order fulfillment; however, it decided to... View Details

Keywords: Pet Food; Pet Products; Retail; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Operations; Decision Choices and Conditions; E-commerce; Retail Industry; Retail Industry

March 2018
Supplement

The Rise and Rise (?) of Walmart (B): Kmart Declares Bankruptcy

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Karen Elterman

This case follows up on the competition between Kmart and Walmart as discussed in the A case. It summarizes the companies' positions in the early 2000s, and discusses events between 1990 and Kmart's declaration of bankruptcy in 2002. Walmart grew significantly,... View Details

Keywords: Bankruptcy; Walmart; Kmart; Controversy; Strategy; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Competition; Public Opinion; Retail Industry; United States

March 2018 (Revised November 2018)
Case

Managing Religion in the Workplace: Abercrombie & Fitch and Masterpiece Cakeshop

By: Derek van Bever

Challenges related to managing religion in the workplace are on the rise, as are religious discrimination claims and monetary settlements, in the United States and around the world. This case examines two incidents of alleged religious discrimination that made their... View Details

Keywords: Religious Discrimination; First Amendment; Religious Freedom Restoration Act; Business Ethics; Religion And Business; Management; EEOC; Ethics; Religion; Conflict Management; Retail Industry; United States

March 2018 (Revised July 2018)
Case

Whole Foods Under Amazon

By: Dennis Campbell, Tatiana Sandino, James Barnett and Christine Snively

In August 2017, Amazon acquired Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion. Whole Foods was struggling with high costs and faced growing competition from traditional supermarkets offering more organic products. Prior to the acquisition, Whole Foods began rolling out a new... View Details

Keywords: Performance Efficiency; Performance Improvement; Employee Relationship Management; Acquisition; Change Management; Retail Industry; Retail Industry

March 2018
Teaching Note

Sandlands Vineyards

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Greg Saldutte

Teaching Note for HBS No.718-438. View Details

March 2018 (Revised June 2018)
Case

Knowledge Sharing at REMA 1000 (A)

By: Tatiana Sandino and Olivia Hull

A year after Norwegian grocery chain REMA 1000 adopted Workplace, Facebook’s enterprise social network, Chief Human Resource Officer Tore Høylie is asked to evaluate its impact on company culture and communication. Almost 90% of the workforce is engaged with the... View Details

Keywords: Social Network; Enterprise Social Media; Facebook; Workplace; Social and Collaborative Networks; Communication Technology; Performance Improvement; Organizational Culture; Knowledge Sharing; Social Media; Retail Industry; Norway

March 2018 (Revised March 2019)
Technical Note

Control or Flexibility? Structured Empowerment Offers Both — Lessons from Retail & Service Chains

By: Tatiana Sandino

This note explains how several retail and service organizations use a practice described here as “structured empowerment” to balance control and flexibility as they grow. I define structured empowerment as a practice that grants employees both (a) the power to make... View Details

Keywords: Service Operations; Standards; Employees; Service Delivery; Decision Making; Power and Influence; Retail Industry; Retail Industry

March 2018 (Revised March 2018)
Teaching Note

OpenInvest

By: Boris Vallee and Caitlin Reimers Brumme

Founded by a team of hedge fund and NGO alumni, OpenInvest launched its platform in 2015 to enable retail investors to tailor their portfolio to their personal values in an automated way, for instance by screening out weapon manufacturers stocks or overweighting LGBTQ... View Details

Keywords: Socially Responsible Investing; Investing For Impact; Robo-advisors; Investment; Values and Beliefs; Customization and Personalization; Technology; Financial Services Industry

March 2018
Teaching Note

Making Target the Target: Boycotts and Corporate Political Activity (A) and (B)

By: Nien-hê Hsieh and Victor Wu

Through the challenges facing Target, the case examines the ways in which corporations can become involved in political and legislative debates and processes, ranging from campaign contributions to lobbying. In 2016, Target CEO Brian Cornell must determine how to... View Details

March 2018 (Revised March 2018)
Supplement

Sandlands Vineyards

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Greg Saldutte

Approximately 80% of the wineries in the US breakeven or lose money. An even greater percentage lose money on an economic basis (i.e., after a charge for the cost of equity). Tegan Passalacqua is a successful, young, Californian winemaker who specializes in making... View Details

March 2018
Article

Scraped Data and Sticky Prices

By: Alberto Cavallo

I use daily prices collected from online retailers in five countries to study the impact of measurement bias on three common price stickiness statistics. Relative to previous results, I find that online prices have longer durations, with fewer price changes close to... View Details

Keywords: Online Data; Scraped Data; Sticky Prices; Scanner Data; Consumer Price Index; Price; Data and Data Sets