Consumer-Driven Demand and Operations Management Models

The consumer demand functions that drive traditional retail sales are the well-defined functions of price and product attributes (e.g., quality, style trends, etc.). However, these new sophisticated selling techniques—examples are mixed sales channels, portals, group buying, and auctions, each of which is enabled by information technologies, the Internet, or both—are changing and expanding consumer-driven demand in many ways. The underlying pattern of demand created by these evolving mechanisms will be a marked departure from traditional factors driving consumer demand. To analyze and understand rational and strategic consumer demand, the editors have divided the book into five discrete sections that first consider rational consumer behavior and the endogenous decision making mechanisms behind it. They then present sections on organizational strategies, product strategies, operational strategies, and, finally, pricing strategies for managing rational/strategic consumer behavior. Together, this handbook provides the state-of-the-art OM models that will help the reader to understand and effectively respond to increasingly rational purchasing behavior.