Sales and Merchandising Commons^™

Willingness To Pay And Market Potential For Biowrap: An Economic Study Of A New Biodegradable Mulch Product In Home Gardening, Gengchen Cai

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

This study explores the market potential of BioWRAP, a biodegradable sprayable weed suppression product, by assessing the willingness to pay (WTP) among American home gardeners. Traditional plastic mulch offers significant agronomic benefits but poses considerable environmental challenges, making BioWRAP a promising alternative due to its similar benefits and reduced environmental impact. Using a double-bounded contingent valuation method, we analyze the WTP for BioWRAP among different demographic groups and gardening practices. Our findings indicate that the highest WTP for BioWRAP is among home gardeners who currently use chemical sprays for weed suppression, followed by those using physical barriers, with the lowest …

Exploring Gen Z’S Identity Formation And Its Influence On Consumption Of Pop Culture And Entertainment Merchandise, Melisa Annette Spilinek

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

Fandoms have grown in size and influence, becoming a complex and dynamic cultural phenomenon that richly impacts the consumption of media and consumer behavior. The capitalistic United States with its diverse and media-savvy population, is a prime destination to study fan studies, particularly among young adults who are a crucial component of fandom influence.

The internet has grown to be a major component of the fan experience, an integral part of fandom culture. Online communities provide avenues for Generation Z to connect with others who share similar struggles, challenges, and interests, highlighting the importance of digital platofrms on the evolution …

A Brief Comparison Of Two Early Neighborhoods: Consumerism And Social Class In 20th Century Lincoln, Nebraska, Mariska Molnar

Department of Anthropology: Theses and Student Research

In the Fall of 2018, Matthew Hansen monitored the destruction of a parking lot two blocks north of the Capitol Building in Lincoln, Nebraska for the subsequent building of a geothermal system. During this period, and excavation was conducted with the aid of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Campus Archaeology Project, and 12 features were identified. Five features produced artifacts, with Feature 11, a cistern, being the most fruitful. The collection was named the Capitol Wellfield, and a portion of the artifacts, which includes diagnostic glass and ceramic pieces, are housed on campus for studying.

Most research and publication have been …

Predicting Mobility Using Limited Data During Early Stages Of A Pandemic, Michael T. Lash, S. Sajeesh, Özgür M. Araz

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed consumer behavior substantially. In this study, we explore the drivers of consumer mobility in several metropolitan areas in the United States under the perceived risks of COVID-19. We capture multiple dimensions of perceived risk using local and national cases and death counts of COVID-19, along with real-time Google Trends data for personal protective equipment (PPE). While Google Trends data are popular inputs in many studies, the risk of multicollinearity escalates with the addition of more relevant terms. Therefore, multicollinearity-alleviating methods are needed to appropriately leverage information provided by Google Trends data. We develop and utilize …

Typology Of Tweets And User Engagement Generated By U.S. Companies Involved In Developing Covid-19 Vaccines, Priyanka Khandelwal, Leslie Ramos Salazar, Soni Khandelwal

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

This study analyzes 295 tweets by four U.S. companies engaged in discovering a vaccine for COVID-19. Tweets were analyzed to understand how their Twitter feeds balanced corporate and product branding (vaccine, medicines, etc.) and disseminated scientific information relating to COVID-19. The results suggest that these companies were actively embedding technical information about COVID-19 in their corporate and product branding. Tweets providing technical and scientific information about the progress made toward developing a COVID-19 vaccine garnered high levels of user engagement from their target audience. Findings from this study indicate the growing importance of technical communication in corporate settings during a …

The Effects Of Received Grandmothers’ Affection On Adult Grandchildren’S Health Behaviors Using Affection Exchange Theory, Leslie Ramos Salzar, Priyanka Khandelwal, Yvette Castillo

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

Background: Affection exchange theory (AET) explains the value of received affection for overall wellbeing in family relationships. However, this study extends prior work by investigating AET in grandmother-grandchild relationships and grandchildren’s individual well-being. This study seeks to understand the relationships between adult grandchildren’s received grandmother affection and health-related behaviors such as diet, exercise, substance abuse, and sleep.

Methods: This cross-sectional study included 229 university student participants. Multiple regression analyses were performed to analyze received grandmother affection and grandchildren’s health behaviors.

Results: Using cross-sectional survey methods, it was found that grandchildren’s reports of received memories and humor, and celebratory affection influenced …

Beauty And Lifestyle Subscription Services: A Modern Retailing Format For The Vigilante Collaborative Consumption Consumer, Melisa Spilinek

Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Advancements in technology and ease of use of online shopping via phone applications (apps) and subscription services have fundamentally changed how consumers shop. Now more than ever, consumers are turning to time-saving technological tools that are subscription services. Subscription services provide a multitude of benefits to consumers and contribute to collaborative consumption in nearly every product and service category from coffee to apparel. To investigate beauty and lifestyle subscription services and collaborative consumption this study will utilize a mixed methods convergent design to analyze user experience including price sensitivity, subscription service apps and ease of use. Anticipated contributions to the …

Influence Of Convenience, Time-Savings, Price, And Product Variety On Amazon Prime Members And Non-Prime Shoppers’ Online Apparel Purchase Intention, Md Rashaduzzaman

Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The number of internet users and online shoppers in the United States has grown at an incredible rate over the past few decades. Greater convenience and availability of a wide assortment of apparel products at a cheaper price made online shopping very enticing to consumers. Amazon.com (Amazon) gained unprecedented popularity among consumers with its Amazon Prime program. Amazon’s retail revolutions changed consumer’s way of shopping and expectations. Both online and physical store retailers are facing tremendous pressure to fulfill that level of expectation. Thus, it is essential for retailers clearly understand the shopping expectations and preferences of Amazon Prime members …

Arbor Day Foundation Consultation, Frances Munro, Drew Spadaro, Trevor Lockard, Mason Smalley, Leigh Hanson, Demi Van Reeuwijk

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Over the past 4 months, our team at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Business Honors Academy has been working directly with Nebraska’s own, Arbor Day Foundation, or Arbor Day, in hopes of applying our skill sets and mindsets to solve a pressing problem Arbor Day currently faces. We have been tasked with the challenge of identifying creative, scalable, and profitable new business ventures for Arbor Day that will aid the generation of new revenue sources. With these sources of revenue, Arbor Day desires to further inspire people to plant, nurture, and celebrate trees and in turn solve some of the …

When And How Frontline Service Employee Authenticity Influences Purchase Intentions, Lynn Matthews, Meike Eilert, Les Carlson, James W. Gentry

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

In this manuscript, we investigate the central role of perceived frontline service employee (FSE) authenticity and the process by which it impacts purchase intentions, taking into account the represented brand's authenticity. While brand authenticity has previously been shown to enhance consumer outcomes, we find that FSE authenticity is a separate significant predictor of purchase intentions. Further, we find that FSE authenticity enhances purchase intentions by increasing perceived trust and perceived quality. However, this finding only holds for brands that do not emphasize their authenticity, indicating that brand managers should differentially emphasize FSE authenticity based on their brand's positioning. Furthermore, we …

Ethical Purchasing Dissonance: Antecedents And Coping Behaviors, Tim Reilly, Amit Saini, Jenifer Skiba

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

The pressure of oversight and scrutiny in the business-to-business purchasing process has the potential to cause psychological distress in purchasing professionals, giving rise to apprehensions about being ethically inappropriate. Utilizing depth interviews with public sector purchasing professionals in a phenomenological approach, the authors develop the notion of ethical purchasing dissonance to explain the psychological distress. An inductively derived conceptual framework is presented for ethical purchasing dissonance that explores its potential antecedents and consequences; illustrative propositions are presented, and managerial implications are discussed.

The Effects Of Immediate And Delayed Payments On Consumptions Behavior, Arvind Agrawal

College of Business: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Payment-timing is conceptualized as a payment instrument focal characteristic to explain differences in consumers’ purchasing behavior when they chose to pay-now versus pay-later. Payment-timing preferences represent consumers’ attitudes, beliefs, and motivation for delaying marketing transactions. Cash, debit cards, and online banking represented consumers’ preferences to pay-now, while credit cards and loans represented the inclination to pay-later.

There were two key findings: Firstly, I present payment-timing models that theorize consumers’ choice of payment types with differences in payment-timing and motivations to pay for purchases. Two models are presented that unify the following attitudes and motivations: (1) five attitudinal antecedents to consumers’ …

Male Breadwinner Ideology And The Inclination To Establish Market Relationships: Model Development Using Data From Germany And A Mixed-Methods Research Strategy, Michaela Haase, Ingrid Becker, Alexander Nill, Clifford J. Shultz Ii, James W. Gentry

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

A pattern found in many marketing systems, “male breadwinning,” is contingent upon overlapping and shared ideologies, which influence the economic organization and thus the type and number of relationships in those systems. Implementing a mixed-methods research methodology, this article continues and extends previous work in macromarketing on the interplay of markets, ideology, socio-economic organization, and family. A qualitative study illuminated the main ideologies behind male breadwinning and a model was developed to advance the theoretical analysis of the phenomenon of male breadwinning. An experiment in the form of a vignette study was subsequently designed and administered. The qualitative study and …

Life Beyond The Like: Uses And Gratifications Of Sharing Business Facebook Page Content, Sara M. Nash

College of Journalism and Mass Communications: Theses

One of the main reasons businesses create a Facebook Page is to solidify relationships with existing customers who are Facebook users and to leverage those relationships to gain new customers. Many studies have asked Facebook users to articulate the gratifications they receive when “liking” a business Facebook Page. These studies help explain what gratifications users gain by connecting to businesses via Facebook. To expand on these findings, the current pilot study applied the uses and gratifications theory to identify Facebook users’ motivations to “share” business Facebook content within their own personal network. Understanding users’ reasons for “sharing” will help businesses …

7 Tips To Grow Your Rural Business With Purpose And Meaning, Connie I. Reimers-Hild, Alyssa Dye

Community Vitality Initiative

No one can predict the future; however, rural entrepreneurs and business owners can use a future-focused leadership approach, which includes examining megatrends, to shape the future of their businesses. Megatrends are global shifts that influence society, the economy and the environment. The purpose of this article is to help rural entrepreneurs discover ways to grow their businesses with Living with Purpose and Meaning Megatrend.

Dispersion Of Marketing Capabilities: Impact On Marketing’S Influence And Business Unit Outcomes, Michael T Krush, Ravipreet Sohi, Amit Saini

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

The marketing function of firms continues to evolve into many configurations, including the dispersion of marketing capabilities. This study evaluates the effects on the marketing function’s influence when marketing capabilities are dispersed across multiple boundaries. Using a sample of marketing executives, we study the effects of two forms of marketing capabilities dispersion: intra-organizational dispersion and inter-organizational dispersion. We examine the impact of these forms on marketing’s perceived influence within the firm. We also investigate marketing’s influence on customer responsiveness, along with three distal outcomes: marketing strategy implementation success, relationship portfolio effectiveness, and business unit performance. Our findings reveal that marketing’s …

Relational Behavior Of Leaders: A Comparison By Vocational Context, G. Ronald Gilbert, Robert C. Myrtle, Ravipreet S. Sohi

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

Organizational researchers widely acknowledge that positive relational behavior is associated with leadership effectiveness. In this exploratory study, we seek to extend previous research examining contextual factors that influence leadership style based on the characteristics of person–vocation fit. Using information derived from a 360° assessment that included one’s top managers, peers, and subordinates (N = 934), we find that leaders working in settings that attract Holland’s Social (S) types demonstrate more positive relational behavior than those who work in Realistic (R) type work settings. Our research also indicates that the relationship between leadership style and perceived effectiveness varies based on …

Deception In Cosmetics Advertising: Examining Cosmetics Advertising Claims In Fashion Magazine Ads / 化妆品广告中的欺骗:分析时尚杂志广告中的化妆品广告, Jie G. Fowler, Timothy H. Reisenwitz, Les Carlson

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

The FDA has only focused upon the physical safety of cosmetics and has ignored the significant reasonability of advertising claims. As such, the present article is intended to examine/ascertain the extent to which cosmetics claims contain deceptive content in fashion ads. Through a content analysis, the study reported herein revealed that cosmetics claims were not evenly distributed. To that end, the preponderance of the claims appeared to be described primarily by three categories (scientific, performance and subjective). The results also showed that more cosmetics claims were classified as deceptive than were deemed as acceptable. Close examination of these trends revealed …

The Relationship Between Fashion Blogs And Intention To Purchase And Word Of Mouth Behavior, Cassidy L. Vineyard

Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Blogs are an influential social media platform and a powerful marketing tool (Hsu & Tsou, 2011). A corporate fashion blog is an online product community. Online product communities established by retailers enable customers to interact with the company as well as amongst themselves (Nambisan & Watt, 2011). Online communities are a social space wherein relationships and ties are formed among the members and a common set of values and norms are established and shared (Nambisan & Watt, 2011).

The objective of this study was threefold. First it explored what factors shape readers’ intention to browse products on blogs. Based on …

The Curvilinear And Conditional Effects Of Product Line Breadth On Salesperson Performance, Role Stress, And Job Satisfaction, Jeff Johnson, Ravipreet S. Sohi

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

The impact of how product line breadth affects a salesperson is unclear in the existing literature. While numerous product lines can provide certain benefits to the salesperson, they may also have a dark side. This research examines the impact of number product lines handled by the salespeople on their performance, role stress, and job satisfaction. Based on role and schema theories, we test a series of curvilinear and conditional effects, using data collected from salespeople across multiple industries. Our analysis indicates non-linear relationships between number of product lines handled by the salesperson and salesperson performance and role stress. Further, these …

An Integrated Marketing Communications Plan For The Great American Comedy Festival, Johnny Carson Theatre, Norfolk, Nebraska, Adnormal Strategies, Emily Schaefer, Tony Nelson, Dominique Brown, Kary Benson, Mickey Mcconkey, Katheryn Schuller, Amanda Gammel, Max Wesely

College of Journalism and Mass Communications: Student Advertising Projects

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Client: The Great American Comedy Festival

Campaign Purpose: In the summer of 2014, members of the Great American Comedy Festival approached our team of 8 advertising and public relation students with a specific task. The proposed task was to help increase attendance as well as raise awareness for future Great American Comedy Festivals. Our team’s mission is to present innovative ideas that will help our client generate an increase in attendance and to also provide them with beneficial tactics for future festivals.

Research: For our campaign, we accumulated various data through both secondary and primary research. Our secondary …

The Influence Of Mobile Website Quality On Consumer Satisfaction And Behavior, Xiuyuan Gao

Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Mobile shopping has grown into a huge market and an increasing number of consumers have begun to use mobile websites to shop. Therefore, how mobile shopping websites provide good shopping to customers is significant. The object of this study is to relate factors of website quality to college students’ satisfaction with mobile shopping experiences, which in turn influence their intentions to return to the website and/or to purchase on the website. Five dimensions of website quality, which were information quality, navigation, visual appeal, response time and interactivity, were selected in this study. The model of self-regulatory process (Bagozzi, 1992) has …

Effects Of Website Environmental Cues On Consumers’ Response And Outcome Behaviors, Eunju Yoon

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Mehrabian and Russell (1974) developed the Stimulus-Organism-Response (S-O-R) model in environmental psychology. This model is used to examine the effects of physical stimuli on human emotions and response behaviors. The development of the Internet and electronic commerce has spurred interest in online shopping research. The S-O-R model has been applied widely to examine consumers’ emotions and responses towards online website stimuli (Eroglu, Machleit, & Davis, 2001; Eroglu, Machleit, and Davis, 2003; Menon & Kahn, 2002; Richard, 2005).

The main objective of this study was to examine the effects of website environmental cues on the consumer’s affective (i.e., hedonic attitude) and …

Saŋɔ Baara Cogo N´A Feere Cogo Gafe: Mogo Minuwye Gafe Dilan Oye = Fiche De Production Et De Commercialisation Du Mil = Production And Marketing Of Millet, Botorou Ouendeba, Niaba Teme

USAID Mali Mission Awards

U.S. government publication about millet production and sales in West Africa. In the Bambara language.

Fiche De Production Et De Commercialisation Du Mil = Production And Marketing Of Millet, Botorou Ouendeba, Niaba Teme

USAID Mali Mission Awards

Publication about production and sales of millet in West Africa. In French.

Ŋɔsibɔ N´A Feere Cɔgɔ = Fiche De Production Et De Commercialisation Du Sorgho, Mali = Production And Marketing Of Sorghum, Mali, Botorou Ouendeba

USAID Mali Mission Awards

U.S. government publication about production and sales of sorghum in West Africa.

Fiche De Production Et De Commercialisation Du Sorgho, Mali = Production And Marketing Of Sorghum, Mali, Botorou Ouendeba

USAID Mali Mission Awards

U.S. government publication about production and sales of sorghum in West Africa. In French.

The Prevalence And Influence Of The Combination Of Humor And Violence In Super Bowl Commercials, Benjamin J. Blackford, James W. Gentry, Robert L. Harrison, Les Carlson

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

The growing concern over violence in the media has led to vast amounts of research examining the effects of violent media on viewers. An important subset of this research looks at how humor affects this relationship. While research has considered this subset in television programming, almost no research has explored this in the context of advertising. This paper builds on the little research that exists by examining the effects of combining humor and violence, as well as the theoretical approaches that underlie these effects. A content analysis is conducted to identify the prevalence of violence, humor, and the combination of …

Departure Boutique, Melissa Heitmann

Interior Design Program: Terminal Projects

Proposal

The following proposal is a design contract for the master planning, development and interior design services for the building on the corner 8th and P in the Haymarket District in Lincoln, Nebraska. The Haymarket District is an active, vibrant, historical area within the city of Lincoln and draws in people of all ages and cultures to this neighborhood. Local gift shops, restaurants, bars, and small businesses culminate this area. To attract more people to this district, I propose to add a boutique salon/spa, a boutique retail store, office space, and loft-style apartments.

The boutique salon/spa will target those of …

What Makes Strategy Making Across The Sales-Marketing Interface More Successful?, Avinash Malshe, Ravipreet S. Sohi

Department of Marketing: Faculty Publications

Extant research on marketing strategy making (MSM) lacks process-based theoretical frameworks that elucidate how marketing strategies are made when sales and marketing functions are involved in the process. Using a grounded theory approach and data collected from (a) 58 depth interviews with sales and marketing professionals and (b) a focus group with 11 marketing professionals, we propose that MSM within the sales-marketing interface is a three-stage, multifaceted process that consists of Groundwork, Transfer and Follow-up stages. Our process-based model explicates the specific activities at each stage that are needed to develop and execute marketing strategies successfully, the sequence in which …