Publications

November 1995
Technical Note

Analyzing Standard Costs: Technical Note

By: V.G. Narayanan

Explains variance analysis. Concepts of price variance and quantity variance are introduced to analyze prime cost variances. Spending variance and capacity variance are used to analyze overhead variance. Consistent with conducting variance analysis in an activity-based... View Details

Keywords: Cost Accounting; Cost; Analysis

October 1990 (Revised May 1994)
Case

Confederated Pulp & Paper

By: David E. Bell

A rewritten version of an old case that updates the dates and prices and simplifies the economics. The issue is still one of determining a suitable inventory of wood for the mill to last through the winter. View Details

Keywords: History; Supply Chain Management; Spending; Forecasting and Prediction; Economic Growth; Information Management; Pulp and Paper Industry

27 Jul 2017
News

Trump takes credit for Foxconn's 'incredible investment'

August 2008 (Revised April 2012)
Supplement

Real Property Negotiation Game (B): Seller, Raleigh Commons

By: Arthur I Segel and John H. Vogel, Jr.

The Real Property Negotiation Game simulates the experience negotiating the sale, purchase, or financing of a property. The class competes as either a lender, buyer, or one of two groups of sellers, Raleigh, North Carolina and Las Vegas, Nevada. The seller case,... View Details

Keywords: Negotiation; Property; Price; Sales; Market Transactions; Real Estate Industry; Raleigh

Research Summary

Valuation Theory and Practice

Timothy A. Luehrman's primary research interest is in the application of valuation methods to companies, businesses, and individual assets. Some of his work involves applications of tools originally developed for valuing derivative securities to the valuation of other... View Details

April 2005
Case

The University of Chicago Investment Office: Investing in Timber

In 2005, the University of Chicago Investment office was deciding how much capital to allocate toward timber investing. Explores the challenges associated with optimal portfolio construction when one of the invested assets is illiquid with limited historical price... View Details

Keywords: Investment Portfolio; Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Services Industry; Education Industry

Video

Vimal Shah

Vimal Shah, Co-Founder and Chairman of Bidco Africa, discusses the group’s strategic approach to marketing soap products in Kenya, targeting the bottom of the pyramid market with multiple brands at different price points to compete with large multinationals such as... 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

2007
Working Paper

How Is Foreign Aid Spent? Evidence from a Natural Experiment

By: Eric D. Werker, Faisal Z. Ahmed and Charles Cohen

We use oil price fluctuations to construct a new instrument to test the impact of transfers from wealthy OPEC nations to their poorer Muslim allies. The instrument identifies plausibly exogenous variation in foreign aid. We investigate how aid is spent by tracking its... View Details

Keywords: International Finance; Energy Sources; Energy Industry; Asia

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14 Oct 2020
Blog Post

Veteran Financial Aid Outlook

charged. Now the good news: After going through the full-time MBA program at HBS (even with the Coronavirus disruption and finishing my last quarter on-line), I don’t think I could put a price on the education and experiences I received.... View Details

December 2013 (Revised January 2015)
Case

Barbara Krakow Gallery

By: Jose Alvarez and Nyssa Liebermann

The Barbara Krakow Gallery is a successful contemporary art gallery located in Boston. It utilizes a very rare "no haggle pricing" strategy and extended sales cycle when selling pieces to collectors. Though it remains profitable and very respected, the size and scope... View Details

February 2021 (Revised July 2024)
Case

White Claw: Defending Market Share as Competition Encroaches

By: Jill Avery

By the end of 2019, two brands accounted for 84% of hard seltzer sales, a segment that had recently taken the U.S. beer market by storm, growing from $3 million in 2015 to over $2.7 billion by the start of the summer of 2020. White Claw was the dominant market leader... View Details

Keywords: Brand Management; Alcoholic Beverages; Beer/brewing Industry; Brand Positioning; Growth; Competitive Positioning; Consumer Products; Beverage Industry; Value Proposition; Marketing; Brands and Branding; Competition; Product Positioning; Competitive Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Consumer Products Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; United States

2019
Chapter

Behavioral Economics and Health-Care Markets

By: Amitabh Chandra, Benjamin Handel and Joshua Schwartzstein

This chapter summarizes research in behavioral health economics, focusing on insurance markets and product markets in health care. We argue that the prevalence of choice difficulties and biases leading to mistakes in these markets establish a special place for them in... View Details

Keywords: Behavioral Economics; Consumer Behavior; Economics; Health Care and Treatment; Insurance; Markets

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March 2004 (Revised April 2005)
Case

Midwest Office Products

By: Robert S. Kaplan

Presents an easy introduction to time-driven activity-based costing (ABC) that allows students to build a simple ABC model of order profitability. Midwest's time-driven ABC approach is based on two categories of parameter estimates. The first is the cost per hour of... View Details

Keywords: Cost; Price; Activity Based Costing and Management; Time Management; Financial Reporting; Profit; Performance Improvement; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Performance Evaluation

August 2008 (Revised April 2012)
Case

Real Property Negotiation Game (A): Seller Case, Raleigh Commons

By: Arthur I Segel and John H. Vogel, Jr.

The Real Property Negotiation Game simulates the experience negotiating the sale, purchase, or financing of a property. The class competes as either a lender, buyer, or one of two groups of sellers, Raleigh, North Carolina and Las Vegas, Nevada. This is the seller... View Details

Keywords: Price; Negotiation; Property; Sales; Financing and Loans; Real Estate Industry; Raleigh

January 2022
Article

Why is Corporate Virtue in the Eye of The Beholder? The Case of ESG Ratings

By: Dane Christensen, George Serafeim and Anywhere Sikochi

Despite the rising use of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ratings, there is substantial disagreement across rating agencies regarding what rating to give to individual firms. As what drives this disagreement is unclear, we examine whether a firm’s ESG... View Details

Keywords: ESG Ratings; Rating Agency Disagreement; ESG Disclosure; Corporate Social Responsibility; Sustainability; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability; Corporate Disclosure