Publications

31 May 2017
Sharpening Your Skills

10 Harvard Business School Research Stories That Will Make Your Mouth Water

"job" that customers were "hiring" a milkshake to do. KFC’s Explosive Growth in China In China, Yum! Brands opens a KFC restaurant every day. But this is not the KFC you know in America. A case study written by David... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Food & Beverage

01 Jun 2022
News

Case Study: Glass Half Full

Amazon and relying instead on Shopify as an online storefront and on ShipBob for fulfillment. Then came the cold shower of reality: Customer acquisition beyond Amazon can prove very expensive. He decided to offer Neutrall’s products there... View Details

Keywords: Jen McFarland Flint; Nonstore Retailers; Retail Trade

Profile

Adam Kanner

percent to 50 percent of tickets to live events go unsold. Reasons for this excess capacity vary, from a hefty rise in ticket prices for concerts and sporting events over the past decade, to a wave of digital entertainment options that keep View Details

01 Jun 2024
News

Case Study: Ready for an Upgrade

Illustration by Alvaro Dominguez The Los Angeles–based startup Stell was borne of a pain point almost as old as recorded history itself: paperwork. One of Stell’s cofounders, Malory McLemore (MBA 2022), had landed a job as an engineer at Airbus after earning a... View Details

Keywords: Jen McFarland Flint; Computer Systems Design and Related Services; Professional Services

01 Feb 1997
News

OPM Celebrates 21st Anniversary at Gala Florida Reunion

H. Schiff Professor of Investment Banking. Drawing on his extensive research on a subject he calls his "passion" - customer loyalty - Sasser led a lively discussion on the topic of customer retention that... View Details

Web

Field Course: Ideation and Prototyping for Innovation - Course Catalog

can be found here . Accepted students will be notified by August 15, 2025. Learning Objectives Most early-stage ventures and new products fail because too few customers want what’s offered. Specifically, either: 1) the product doesn’t... View Details

02 Apr 2015
Research & Ideas

Digital Initiative Summit: Freeing Patient Data to Enable Innovation

Patients are not actually the customers in the United States health care system, a fact largely to blame for the dearth of communication and data sharing between providers, according to experts at a recent Harvard Business School... View Details

Keywords: Re: Karim R. Lakhani; Health

01 Jun 2000
News

Flexibility Is Key to Product Development in Internet Time

When the number of Internet-based businesses took off in the mid-1990s, many long-standing rules for product innovation were blown away. Previous models of development based on a sequential process of planning and execution are not workable in the Internet age, where... View Details

Keywords: Judith A. Ross

25 Aug 2022
News

Action Plan: Fired Up

fundamental purpose that’s meaningful both to customers and employees,” he says. “You strive to be the best version of your customers.” That goal was relatively easy to attain in his previous role as CEO of the trendsetting headphone... View Details

Keywords: Deborah Blagg; company culture; barbecue; entertaining; food; marketing; brand

18 Jul 2018
Blog Post

Amira Rashad: An Ambidextrous Mind Meets Consumer Needs in the Middle East

make it easy for BulkWhiz to justify deliveries. But it's the transparent data that gives the company its greatest advantage. "We use data to serve customers and to help us better understand them. Our vertical growth potential is immense;... View Details

15 Dec 2014
Research & Ideas

Deconstructing the Price Tag

itemizes what it spends on cotton, cutting, sewing, dyeing, finishing, and transporting each shirt, consumers become more attracted to the brand and more likely to purchase. “By unpacking the costs, you have the opportunity to explain everything you did for the View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Retail

24 Apr 2014
News

Exploring new ways to understand and engage audiences

Victoria Ransom (MBA 2008) launched Wildfire Interactive, now a Google company, to connect companies and customers through social media. (Published April 2014) View Details

November 2024
Case

Polish Agro: Where Do We Grow From Here?

By: Willy C. Shih, Lena Duchene and Daniela Beyersdorfer

By July 2024, Polish Agro had grown into one of Poland’s fastest-growing agribusinesses, with €230 million in revenue, 82 employees, and operations across Northern Poland. The company supported farmers with essential agricultural inputs like fertilizers and seeds,... View Details

December 1989 (Revised April 1997)
Case

Destin Brass Products Co.

By: William J. Bruns Jr.

A specialized manufacturer of brass valves, pumps, and flow controllers is troubled by competitive pricing in pumps and higher than expected margins for flow controllers. Managers suspect that cost accounting and cost allocations to products may be to blame. Two... View Details

Keywords: Cost Accounting; Activity Based Costing and Management; Five Forces Framework; Customer Value and Value Chain; Competition; Business Strategy; Design; Inflation and Deflation; Asset Pricing; Governance Controls; Manufacturing Industry

May 1994
Background Note

Reorienting Channels of Distribution

By: V. Kasturi Rangan

Traditionally, distribution channels have been viewed as vertical marketing systems where responsibility was transferred from one layer to the next, like passing a baton in a relay race. Distribution channels in the future are likely to look more like horizontal... View Details

Keywords: Distribution Channels; Customers; Supply and Industry; Alliances; Performance Efficiency; Performance Effectiveness; Change; Distribution Industry

01 Apr 2001
News

William Fung: E-Commerce and Efficiency

Internet to improve efficiency and cater to new customers is a clear winner. Group managing director William K.L. Fung (MBA ’72) understands that e-commerce is revolutionary. “But it won’t change what our business is,” he insists. “We’re... View Details

Keywords: Alejandro Reyes; Clothing and Clothing Accessories Stores; Retail Trade

November 2022
Case

The Battle Among Channels for Marketing Pharmaceuticals: UpScript, Pharmacy Benefit Managers, and Direct-to-Consumer Sales

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and Tiffany Farrell

Can an online, direct-to-consumer pharmacy both improve the quality and speed of care for patients who need branded drugs and stabilize profits for pharmaceutical manufacturers? UpScript, after years spent achieving legal and regulatory compliance and simultaneous... View Details

Keywords: DTC; Internet and the Web; Marketing Channels; Customer Value and Value Chain; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Competitive Strategy; Service Delivery; Growth and Development Strategy; Pharmaceutical Industry; Health Industry; Retail Industry