Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(841)
- Faculty Publications (204)
- Fall 2018
- Article
The Value of Fit Information in Online Retail: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment
By: Santiago Gallino and Antonio Moreno
Online channels generate frictions when selling products with nondigital attributes, such as apparel. Customers may be reluctant to purchase products they have not been able to try on, and those customers who do purchase may return products when they do not fit as... View Details
- 2018
- Working Paper
Opportunistic Returns and Dynamic Pricing: Empirical Evidence from Online Retailing in Emerging Markets
By: Chaithanya Bandi, Antonio Moreno, Donald Ngwe and Zhiji Xu
We investigate how dynamic pricing can lead to more product returns in the online retail industry. Using detailed sales data of more than two million transactions from the Indian online retail market, where price promotions are very common, we document two types of... View Details
- 2019
- Working Paper
Large-Scale Demand Estimation with Search Data
By: Tomomichi Amano, Andrew Rhodes and Stephan Seiler
In many online markets, traditional methods of demand estimation are difficult to implement because assortments are very large and individual products are sold infrequently. At the same time, data on consumer search (i.e., browsing) behavior are often available and are... View Details
- August 2018 (Revised February 2019)
- Case
Shindigz
By: Frank Cespedes
Shindigz provides party and celebratory items for various occasions and events through its branded online channel, through third-party retail and wholesale channels, and external online marketplaces. The case focuses on pricing challenges facing a venture with an... View Details
- June 2018
- Case
The Grommet in 2018
By: Lynda M. Applegate, Karen Gordon Mills and Lena Goldberg
The Grommet, an online product launch platform, was at the brink of scaling its business. The Grommet's daily launch and sale of innovative consumer products, using personal videos created by product makers, had led to its initial success. In 2014, the company launched... View Details
- 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
- 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
- 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
- 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
- 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
Keywords: Public Opinion; Social Issues; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Problems and Challenges; Laws and Statutes; Rights; Crisis Management; Risk Management; Media; Political Elections; Taxation; Corporate Accountability; Values and Beliefs; Fairness; Diversity; Customers; Communication; Business and Government Relations; Retail Industry; United States
- 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
- February 2018
- Case
Montes Calcados: A Step Ahead
By: James L. Heskett and James T. Kindley
Montes Calçados (MC) is a well-known "fast-fashion" Brazilian manufacturer of casual, but fashionable, shoes for women aged 18–35 in major cities worldwide. To boost its declining revenues, MC must evaluate two growth options: whether to expand distribution online (at... View Details
- January 2018 (Revised March 2019)
- Teaching Note
Jumia Nigeria: from Retail to Marketplace (A) and (B)
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Karen Elterman
Founded in 2012, Jumia Nigeria, a startup effort by Germany-based Rocket Internet, aimed to become an African Amazon. The company entered the nascent market and immediately enjoyed an uptick in consumer spending fueled by the strength of Nigeria’s oil-based economy. By... View Details
- December 2017 (Revised March 2019)
- Case
Armarium: Luxury Fashion Brands for Rent
By: Jill Avery, David Fubini, Natasha Dossa and Devon Stewart
Armarium, a two-sided online platform that offered consumers the opportunity to rent the most coveted, current season high fashion clothing and accessories from the top global luxury brands, had emerged from its first sales season with two distinct customer segments:... View Details
Keywords: Brand Management; Retailing; Sharing Economy; Luxury Brand; Ecommerce; Startup; Fashion; Brand Positioning; Customer Acquisition; Internet Marketing; Marketing; Marketing Channels; Marketing Strategy; Brands and Branding; Business Startups; Luxury; Consumer Behavior; Growth and Development Strategy; Social Media; E-commerce; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; United States; North America
- January 2018
- Supplement
Jumia Nigeria PowerPoint Supplement
Founded in 2012, Jumia Nigeria, a startup effort by Germany-based Rocket Internet, aimed to become an African Amazon. The company entered the nascent market and immediately enjoyed an uptick in consumer spending fueled by the strength of Nigeria’s oil-based economy. By... View Details
- November 2017 (Revised October 2018)
- Case
Brandless: Disrupting Consumer Packaged Goods
By: Jill Avery
Brandless, an online direct-to-consumer seller of upscale private-label consumer packaged goods, offered consumers a limited assortment of values-conscious products delivered directly to their homes with the simplicity of one fixed $3 price point that promised an... View Details
Keywords: Brand; Brand Management; Retailing; Retailing Industry; Private Label; Direct To Consumer Marketing; Ecommerce; Digital Marketing; Consumer Packaged Goods; Startup; Marketing; Marketing Strategy; Disruption; Food; Product Marketing; Marketing Channels; Consumer Behavior; Brands and Branding; Venture Capital; E-commerce; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; United States; North America
- November–December 2017
- Article
Match Your Own Price? Self-Matching as a Retailer's Multichannel Pricing Strategy
By: Pavel Kireyev, Vineet Kumar and Elie Ofek
Multichannel retailing has created several new strategic choices for retailers. With respect to pricing, an important decision is whether to offer a “self-matching policy,” which allows a multichannel retailer to offer the lowest of its online and store prices to... View Details
- October 2017
- Case
Shift Technologies, Inc.
By: Thomas Eisenmann and Nicole Tempest Keller
In 2017, management at Shift, an online marketplace that uses a “high touch,” concierge approach to buy and sell used cars, was formulating plans for the San Francisco–based startup’s next phase of expansion. One option was to preserve Shift’s current business model... View Details
- October 2017 (Revised October 2022)
- Case
Jumia Nigeria: from Retail to Marketplace (A)
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Namrata Arora
Founded in 2012, Jumia Nigeria, a startup effort by Germany-based Rocket Internet, aimed to become an African Amazon. The company entered the nascent market and immediately enjoyed an uptick in consumer spending fueled by the strength of Nigeria’s oil-based economy. By... View Details
- Article
Channel Integration, Sales Dispersion, and Inventory Management
By: Santiago Gallino, Antonio Moreno and Ioannis Stamatopoulos
We study the effects of the introduction of cross-channel functionalities on the overall sales dispersion of retailers and the implications of these effects for inventory management. To do that, we analyze data from a leading U.S. retailer who introduced a... View Details