Unit Demand - Publications - Faculty & Research

19 Aug 2015
Research & Ideas

Codeacademy’s Delicate Work of Adding Monetization Without Crushing Mission

users. Not only does it teach a skill set (coding) that is increasingly in demand in the job market, but its users are so loyal and engaged that they have provided the bulk of the learning content themselves at no cost. Codecademy's... View Details

Keywords: Re: Jeffrey J. Bussgang; Technology

15 Oct 2014
Research & Ideas

Apple Pay’s Technology Adoption Problem

communications readers used by Apple Pay unless consumer demand is high. First off, Apple must convince merchants to adopt its service, says Willy Shih, the Robert and Jane Cizik Professor of Management Practice. “I think Apple has its... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Technology; Retail

20 Aug 2018
Research & Ideas

Bargain Hunters Beware: A Store's 'Original Price' Might Not Be After All

PeopleImages Sale! Even the word is enough to send a flutter through the hearts of certain shoppers, who salivate in anticipation of scoring a discount off a product’s original price. Few consumers stop to think, however, that the only way they know they are getting a... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Advertising; Retail

19 Nov 2001
Research & Ideas

Alfred Chandler on the Electronic Century

public use—major new products of either consumer electronics or computer hardware with their essential software technologies. In the United States, no enterprise had the capability to commercialize new consumer electronics technologies.... View Details

Keywords: by Alfred D. Chandler, Takashi Hikino & Andrew Von Nordenflycht; Computer; Consumer Products; Electronics; Manufacturing; Technology

14 May 2012
Research & Ideas

Breaking the Smartphone Addiction

world's most elite and demanding professional service firms—The Boston Consulting Group (BCG)—could work together to ensure that they each could truly disconnect from work for a scheduled unit of time each... View Details

Keywords: by Leslie A. Perlow

23 Jan 2008
First Look

First Look: January 23, 2008

correlated with less individualism. We provide three short models that help interpret this correlation. One implication of this finding is that societies that depend heavily on oil, and perhaps natural resources more generally, will experience a heavier View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

December 2020 (Revised May 2021)
Case

Riverstone

By: David E. Bell and Natalie Kindred

In 2020, Luke Minion and the leadership team at Riverstone, a hog producer founded in 2013 in Shandong, China, were evaluating Riverstone’s strategy as it rebounded from outbreaks of African Swine Fever (ASF) in two of its three farm complexes. Riverstone was a joint... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Globalization; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Consumer Behavior; Demand and Consumers; Disruption; Risk and Uncertainty; Risk Management; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Consulting Industry; United States; China

Citation

Educators

Purchase

11 Nov 2013
Research & Ideas

A Smarter Way to Reduce Customer Defections

paper. Lost customers lead to untapped dollars. A McKinsey report estimated that reducing churn could increase earnings of a typical US wireless carrier by as much as 9.9 percent. It's no surprise then that executives in both the United... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Retail; Service

13 Apr 2020
Research & Ideas

Small Businesses Are Worse Off Than We Thought

in-person operations, sinking demand to near zero. Professional services businesses have fared better, but they have not been spared—just 63 percent say they could weather a four-month public health lockdown. [div class=infogram-embed... View Details

Keywords: by Kristen Senz; Financial Services

23 Sep 2013
Research & Ideas

Status: When and Why It Matters

like to believe that people pay for status for purely symbolic reasons, but the empirical evidence for that has been weak at best," says Harvard Business School's Daniel Malter, an assistant professor in the Strategy unit who studies... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

20 Dec 2011
First Look

First Look: December 20

regime of civil liability as currently designed may not have been seen as a source of economic value for outside investors. Download the paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/11-072.pdf Observation Bias: The Impact of Demand Censoring on... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

March 1979 (Revised June 1983)
Background Note

Note on the Microwave Oven Industry

Describes the U.S. consumer market for microwave cooking products in 1978. A slowdown in market growth presents several strategy issues for industry participants. View Details

Keywords: Demand and Consumers; Consumer Products Industry; United States

Citation

Find at Harvard

29 Jan 2013
Research & Ideas

Creating the Perfect Super Bowl Ad

question whether ads, including the over-the-top Super Bowl spots, have become too entertaining, says Thales S. Teixeira, an assistant professor in the Marketing unit at Harvard Business School. In upcoming research, Why, When and How... View Details

Keywords: by Kim Girard; Advertising; Media & Broadcasting

06 Jun 2013
Op-Ed

How to Do Away with the Dangers of Outsourcing

and on and on—a coalition of associates that spanned the earth and in the end proved nearly as dysfunctional as the real United Nations often seems. Outsourcing woes cost the 787 an estimated three extra years of development, required... View Details

Keywords: by Ranjay Gulati; Manufacturing; Apparel & Accessories; Fashion

27 Oct 2009
First Look

First Look: October 27

Working Papers Money or Knowledge? What Drives Demand for Financial Services in Emerging Markets? (revised) Authors: Shawn Cole, Thomas Sampson, and Bilal Zia Abstract Why is demand for formal financial... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

25 May 2016
Research & Ideas

How Consumers and Businesses are Reshaping Public Health

Editor's note. In the United States, a primary provider of health care is through employers. "Every corporation is a player in public health," writes John A. Quelch in a new book of case studies, Consumers, Corporations, and... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch; Health

04 May 2009
Research & Ideas

What’s Next for the Big Financial Brands

Insurance Corporation. Today, the FDIC is the most important ingredient brand in the world, way more important than Intel. Trust in the FDIC and the United States Government enables consumers to confidently deposit up to $250,000 in any... View Details

Keywords: by John Quelch; Banking; Financial Services

10 Dec 2013
First Look

First Look: December 10

across the United States: proximity to historical mining deposits is associated with bigger firms and fewer start-ups in the middle of the 20th century. We use mines as an instrument for our entrepreneurship measures and find a persistent... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

24 Mar 2020
Research & Ideas

These Coronavirus Heroes Show Us How Crisis Leadership Works

in Galway, Ireland. He has publicly committed to double production from 5,000 to 10,000 units per month, but that is just the start. Next come the challenges of getting supplies from all over the world, hiring and training new employees,... View Details

Keywords: by Bill George; Health

June 2013 (Revised June 2014)
Case

Valero Energy Corporation and Tight Oil

By: Richard H.K. Vietor, Eric Adamson, Aaron Byrd, Ned Chiverton, Mariko Meier and Rob Rain

Valero Energy, an incredibly successful US refiner, needs to make some decisions about tight oil. As production of light tight oil increases—from Eagle Ford, Bakken and elsewhere—Valero considers whether to add topping capacity to handle it, on top of its recent... View Details