Publications

August 1995 (Revised January 1997)
Exercise

Consumer Behavior Exercise (D)

By: John A. Deighton and Susan M. Fournier

Students are instructed to interview a recent purchaser of a low-involvement product or service in depth about his/her ownership and usage experiences. The exercise provides students with first-hand understanding of important concepts in consumption domain (e.g.,... View Details

Keywords: Consumer Behavior

December 1989
Case

Giant Effort to Inform Consumers

By: Stephen A. Greyser and Norman Klein

Keywords: Customers; Demand and Consumers

Find at Harvard

06 Dec 2020
Working Paper Summaries

'Repayment-by-Purchase' Helps Consumers to Reduce Credit Card Debt

Keywords: by Grant E. Donnelly, Cait Lamberton, Stephen Bush, Zoe Chance, and Michael I. Norton

2000
Chapter

Strategies of Consumer Group Mobilization

By: Gunnar Trumbull

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Consumer Behavior; Marketing Strategy; Groups and Teams

06 Dec 2022
Research & Ideas

Latest Isn’t Always Greatest: Why Product Updates Capture Consumers

Because consumers gravitate to merchandise labeled as “updated,” even if the items are not necessarily improved, according to the results. "Once something says ‘revised’ on it, it makes you suspend critical judgment." “After showing... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Consumer Products; Consumer Products

April 2006
Case

Finance Leadership in Novartis Consumer Health Businesses

By: Boris Groysberg and Ingrid Vargas

Describes and contrasts the roles and challenges of three high-performing finance heads at Novartis Consumer Health businesses in Australia, Japan, and Venezuela. All three faced tremendous pressures in terms of managing time and limited resources, but the particular... View Details

Keywords: Finance; Financial Management; Multinational Firms and Management; Leadership Style; Health Industry; Japan; Australia; Venezuela

31 May 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Extremeness Seeking: When and Why Consumers Prefer the Extremes

Keywords: by John T. Gourville & Dilip Soman

26 Mar 2012
Research & Ideas

What Neuroscience Tells Us About Consumer Desire

brain data to play a key role in future research on consumer choice. (In a recent HBS industry background note on neuromarketing, she discusses the techniques that have helped researchers decode secrets such as why people love... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Consumer Products

24 Feb 2020
Working Paper Summaries

Recovering Investor Expectations from Demand for Index Funds

Keywords: by Mark Egan, Alexander J. MacKay, and Hanbin Yang

2001
Other Unpublished Work

Intermedia Substitutability and Market Demand by National Advertisers

By: Alvin J. Silk, Lisa R. Klein and Ernst R. Berndt

Keywords: Advertising; Media; Demand and Consumers; Advertising Industry

Fall 2016
Article

The Impact of Supplier Inventory Service Level on Retailer Demand

By: Nathan Craig, Nicole DeHoratius and Ananth Raman

To set inventory service levels, suppliers must understand how changes in inventory service level affect demand. We build on prior research, which uses analytical models and laboratory experiments to study the impact of a supplier’s service level on demand from... View Details

Keywords: Demand and Consumers; Service Delivery; Supply Chain; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Retail Industry

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Read Now

March 2002 (Revised July 2002)
Case

TiVo in 2002: Consumer Behavior

Brodie Keast is anxious to understand the sharp contrast between the inertia of prospects and the deep emotional response shown by converted users of TiVo. After an overview of the company's situation and problems, the case focuses on different kinds of data (sales... View Details

Keywords: Consumer Behavior; Television Entertainment; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

November 2003 (Revised April 2004)
Background Note

Why Consumers Don't Buy: The Psychology of New Product Adoption

By: John T. Gourville

Looks at the consumer psychology of new product adoption. Identifies a key reason why consumers do not adopt innovations as quickly as developers think they should--an irrational resistance to behavioral change. Identifies strategies for firms to manage and overcome... View Details

Keywords: Product Launch; Consumer Behavior; Social Psychology

January 2004
Background Note

Why Developers Don't Understand Why Consumers Don't Buy

By: John T. Gourville

Looks at the psychological biases developers bring to the new product development process. Identifies three reasons why developers may do a poor job of identifying the demand for an innovative, new concept or product: (1) the self-selection bias, (2) differing initial... View Details

Keywords: Customer Focus and Relationships; Innovation and Invention; Knowledge Management; Product Marketing; Consumer Behavior; Product Development; Perspective; Prejudice and Bias

8 Jun 2015
Talk

How Prices Really Affect Consumers

By: Shelle Santana

Keywords: Behavioral Pricing; Price; Consumer Behavior

Forthcoming
Article

Supply and Demand and the Term Structure of Interest Rates

By: Robin Greenwood, Samuel G. Hanson and Dimitri Vayanos

We survey the growing literature emphasizing the role that supply-and-demand forces play in shaping the term structure of interest rates. Our starting point is the Vayanos and Vila (2009, 2021) model of the term structure of default-free bond yields, which we present... View Details

Keywords: Demand and Consumers; Interest Rates; Bonds; Financial Markets

01 Dec 2020
News

Digital Health Care: Empowering Consumers

these trends? Professor Regina Herzlinger on creating breakthrough services, products, and business models in health care Consumers are busy. It used to be that we called health care consumers “patients,” as... View Details

Keywords: April White

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; Consumer Products Industry; Consumer Products Industry; United States; Europe

March 2011
Module Note

Quantitative Analysis of Competitive Position: Customer Demand and Willingness to Pay

By: David J. Collis

This note is designed to provide strategists with tools to perform two critical customer-related analyses: determining willingness to pay — the estimation of how much a given customer would be willing to pay for a particular product or service; and demand estimation —... View Details

Keywords: Price; Demand and Consumers; Competitive Advantage; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Market Participation; Segmentation