Publications

April 2016 (Revised December 2016)
Case

The Container Store

By: Tatiana Sandino, Zeynep Ton and Aldo Sesia

The Container Store (TCS) is a Texas-based retailer of organization and storage solutions. The company prides itself in taking care of its employees first, and its cofounder and CEO Kip Tindell practices Conscious Capitalism. Since its beginnings in 1978, TCS grew to a... View Details

Keywords: Culture; Conscious Capitalism; Merchandising; Customer Focus and Relationships; Growth and Development Strategy; Operations; Service Delivery; Going Public; Performance Evaluation; Performance Productivity; Retail Industry; United States

24 Oct 2006
First Look

First Look: October 24, 2006

pursue further globalization, Natura must now decide whether to continue to rely primarily on the direct sales model or to experiment with other models—and whether to make acquisitions or become part of a larger group. Purchase this case: View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

10 Nov 2008
Research Event

Social Media Leads the Future of Technology

where approximately 217 million online players interact. This is an evolving landscape, with much growth remaining, Yoffie said. Of 6.5 billion people in the world, about 1.5 billion have Internet access, more than 300 million have... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

April 1990 (Revised November 1992)
Case

Population Services International: The Social Marketing Project in Bangladesh (Abridged)

By: James E. Austin

Population Services International (PSI) was a not-for-profit agency founded to disseminate family planning information and to market birth control products, primarily in less developed countries seeking to curb their population explosions. In 1976, PSI concluded an... View Details

Keywords: Conferences; Developing Countries and Economies; Information Publishing; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing Strategy; Social Marketing; Agreements and Arrangements; Product; Nonprofit Organizations; Pharmaceutical Industry; Bangladesh; Washington (state, US)

August 2018
Teaching Note

IguanaFix

By: Frank V. Cespedes and Thomas Eisenmann

Teaching Note for HBS No. 817-056. IguanaFix, based in Argentina, is a platform business that connects consumers with home improvement contractors. The founders are evaluating growth options and an investment offer. The case focuses on scaling issues for a venture... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurial Marketing; Home Improvement Services; Marketing Management; Scaling; Entrepreneurship; Marketing; Sales; Digital Platforms; Growth and Development Strategy

Web

Great American Business Leaders of the 20th Century - Leadership

photography Air-conditioning begins to realize commercial potential Influence: High 40 1940 19 Planes and ships built in less than a day for the war effort Atomic bomb ENIAC computer Penicillin used extensively to treat soldiers' infections Synthetic rubberx Influence:... View Details

22 Apr 2019
Research & Ideas

Why Salespeople Struggle at Leading

This sad scenario plays out at many firms: Top-performing salespeople get promoted to become sales managers, but don’t actually know how to manage. The result is a disaster—productivity takes a dive, disgruntled salespeople start heading... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

Web

Behavioral Finance & Financial Stability

Info Do Fire Sales Create Externalities? By: Sergey Chernenko & Adi Sunderam DEC 2018 How do cash policies affect stock returns? A mutual fund that uses its cash reserves to accommodate outflows will lower the volatility of its underlying... View Details

2009
Working Paper

Do Friends Influence Purchases in a Social Network?

By: Raghuram Iyengar, Sangman Han and Sunil Gupta

Social networks, such as Facebook and Myspace have witnessed a rapid growth in their membership. Some of these businesses have tried an advertising-based model with very limited success. However, these businesses have not fully explored the power of their members to... View Details

Keywords: Marketing; Network Effects; Sales; Power and Influence; Social and Collaborative Networks; Web Sites; South Korea

Read Now

11 Dec 2012
First Look

First Look: Dec. 11

and Efficiency in the Market for IP Addresses Authors:Edelman, Benjamin, and Michael Schwarz Abstract We consider market rules for the transfer of IP addresses, numeric identifiers required by all computers connected to the Internet. Excessive fragmentation of IP... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

October 2023
Case

CornerUp: Digitizing the Corner Store

By: Álvaro Rodríguez Arregui, Stacy Straaberg and Diego Zainos De La Sota Riva

In July 2023, Jason Diaz, co-founder and CEO of CornerUp, assessed the progress of his business-to-business e-procurement software application (app) startup, founded in January 2022. CornerUp began as a fast-moving consumer packaged goods (FMCG) distributor in New York... View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Business Startups; Small Business; Transition; Decisions; Social Entrepreneurship; Geographic Location; Disruptive Innovation; Market Participation; Digital Platforms; Trust; Business Strategy; Expansion; Information Infrastructure; Internet and the Web; Technology Adoption; Value Creation; Technology Industry; United States

June 2010
Case

FoldRite Furniture Company: Planning to Meet a Surge in Demand

By: Steven C. Wheelwright and Afarin Bellisario

Demand for folding and stackable chairs and tables at FoldRite Furniture Co. is unexpectedly strong. The company spent the previous two years improving manufacturing quality and efficiency, dropping poor-performing product lines, developing new products that are... View Details

Keywords: Manufacturing; Production Capacity; Production Scheduling; Risk Management; Growth Management; Production; Logistics; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Business Strategy; Manufacturing Industry; Consumer Products Industry; United States; Europe

09 Dec 2002
Research & Ideas

Unilever—A Case Study

1929 by a merger of British and Dutch soap and margarine companies, 1 it has ranked as one of Europe's, and the world's, largest consumer-goods companies. Its sales of $45,679 million in 2000 ranked it fifty-fourth by revenues in the... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones; Consumer Products; Entertainment & Recreation; Food & Beverage; Manufacturing; Retail

Web

Technology & Operations Management - Faculty & Research

allocations in order to achieve the same growth in scientific output that we predict under alternative allocations of the current budget. Scaling to the population level, this equates to billions of dollars in funding—there are... View Details

18 Mar 2008
First Look

First Look: March 18, 2008

Economic Activity.") Abstract This paper examines the effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on growth by focusing on the complementarities between FDI in flows and financial markets. In our earlier work, we find that FDI is... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

November 2001
Case

Korea-Tender

By: Das Narayandas and Kate Attea

Korea-Tender is a closed-bidding auction company trying to break even and must select the best opportunity to increase membership and revenue. It can continue its current model with heavy advertising, try to modify its costs, or develop an additional business model... View Details

Keywords: Auctions; Business Model; Advertising; Business Startups; Problems and Challenges; Marketing Strategy; Revenue; Growth and Development Strategy

December 1996 (Revised June 1998)
Case

Midnight Networks, Inc.

By: H. Kent Bowen and Marilyn Matis

Midnight Networks, Inc., is a small computer network validation company. This case describes how the five founders built their business from operations earnings and how they established "best practices" operational processes to run their firm successfully. Operational... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Entrepreneurship; Business or Company Management; Operations; Organizational Culture; Applications and Software; Business Startups; Business Growth and Maturation; Information Technology Industry; Massachusetts