Business Commons^™

The Role Of Expectation–Reality Discrepancy In Service Contracts, Xuying Zhao, Hong Guo, Gangshu (George) Cai

Information Systems and Analytics

Service contracts are common practice in some industries while being eliminated in others. To investigate this phenomenon, we identify expectation–reality discrepancy (ERD) as a key determinant. A provider's ERD is defined as consumers’ ex-ante expected valuation minus their ex-post realized valuation of the provider's service. Our analysis reveals that providers’ contract strategies critically depend on their ERDs rather than the true service valuations. A provider with a higher ERD is more likely to enforce contracts, regardless of whether the true service valuation is higher than that of the competitor. Providers should enforce contracts only when they have positive ERDs. Furthermore, …

Nebraska Cow-Calf Operations: Use Of Pricing Tools And Market Diversification Strategies To Manage Market Risk, Logan Kalkowski

Department of Agricultural Economics: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This thesis is the work of Logan Kalkowski with assistance and direction from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and advisors Jay Parsons and Elliott J. Dennis. This thesis is divided into three chapters. The first chapter of this thesis investigates years of research and data collection from multiple agencies to find connections to reasoning for producers to choose marketing and diversification tools used in their operation.

The second chapter examines cow-calf marketing and risk management practices in Nebraska. Marketing and risk management behavior are examined by using the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Cow-calf survey data collected in 2016. The survey captures characteristics …

Studies On Data-Driven Management Of Extended Warranty Service For Household Appliances, Heng Li

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Extended warranty is an important part of after-sales service for household appliances. However, due to management reasons and moral hazard, there are various risks in the extended warranty service for household appliances. It is urgent to make a systematic and in-depth study and provide suggestions for improvement of corresponding management measures.

In order to improve the current strategy of extended warranty service, this paper systematically and deeply studies the compensation scenario, profit and loss, and pricing of extended warranty service of a household appliance retailer, G-Company. This paper firstly analyzes the data of G-Company's extended warranty service, including the time …

Joint Innovation Investment And Pricing Decisions In Retail Supply Chains With Customer Value, Jiali Qu, Benyong Hu, Chao Meng

Faculty Publications

In the retail industry, customer value has become the key to maintaining competitive advantages. In the era of new retail, customer value is not only affected by the product price, but it is also closely related to innovations, such as value‐added services and unique business models. In this paper, we study the joint innovation investment and pricing decisions in a retailer–supplier supply chain based on revenue sharing contracts and customer value. We first find that, in the non-cooperative game, equilibrium only exists in the supplier Stackelberg game. However, revenue sharing contracts cannot coordinate the supply chain in the non‐cooperative game. …

Price Optimization For Revenue Maximization At Scale, Nikhil Gupta, Massimiliano Moro, Kailey A. Ayala, Bivin Sadler

SMU Data Science Review

This study presents a novel approach to price optimization in order to maximize revenue for the distribution market of non-perishable products. Data analysis techniques such as association mining, statistical modeling, machine learning, and an automated machine learning platform are used to forecast the demand for products considering the impact of pricing. The techniques used allow for accurate modeling of the customer’s buying patterns including cross effects such as cannibalization and the halo effect. This study uses data from 2013 to 2019 for Super Premium Whiskey from a large distributor of alcoholic beverages. The expected demand and the ideal pricing strategy …

Fixed Costs And The Division Of Labor, Haiwen Zhou

Economics Faculty Publications

How market size and the level of coordination costs determine the degree of specialization is studied in an infinite horizon model with the amount of capital determined endogenously. Firms producing the same intermediate good engage in oligopolistic competition and choose the degree of specialization of their technologies to maximize profits. A more specialized technology is a technology with a lower marginal cost, but a higher fixed cost. Interestingly, the relationship between the level of coordination costs and a firm’s degree of specialization is ambiguous. A firm in a country with a larger market size, more patient citizens, or a higher …

A Qualitative Exploration Of Ticket-Pricing Decisions In Intercollegiate Athletics, Craig A. Morehead, Stephen L. Shapiro, Lamar Reams, Chad Mcevoy, Timothy M. Madden

Human Movement Studies & Special Education Faculty Publications

Ticket sales represent a significant revenue stream for NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision athletic departments, yet little is known about how administrators determine prices for those tickets. Utilizing strategic planning as the primary framework and supplemented by stakeholder theory, this study examines ticket-pricing decisions from the viewpoint of athletic administrators with various departmental responsibilities to better understand the role of ticket pricing in intercollegiate sport. Twenty athletic administrators, representing two Power 5 and two Group of 5 institutions, were interviewed about their experiences with ticket pricing. In addition to common pricing objectives related to revenue, patronage, and operations, administrators also suggested …