Price Guarantees And Promotional Effort Based On Strategic Consumer Behavior

With the de velopment of commodity econom y, there is increasingly various type of goods and product life cycle is becom ing shorte r. Many sellers are confronting fierce competition, and they often discoun t the products to clear th e remaining inventory at the end of selling season. When consumers go shopping, they should make a decision between buy immediately and wait to purchase discount products, which can maximize their utility. The behavior that compares different options to maximize their utility is known as strategic consumer behavior. In recen t years , the im pact of strategic consum er behavior o n the supply chain has becom e a hot issue. Som e aspects of research are investigated based on strategic consumer behavior in the thesis. The main work of the thesis as bellow:(1) Based on S trategies consumer behavior, the im pact of m ost favored consum er contract and price guarantees on the supply chain is studied. A supply chain consisting of one m anufacture, one seller , and a group of consum ers with strategic behavior is considered in the paper. The retailer proclaims to implement price guarantee policy before selling. The selling season is divided into tw o periods-the regular period and the salvage period. If the consumer purchases in the regular period, he can claim the price difference in the salvage period. Strategic consumers must decide whether buy now or later . Combined contract of wholesale price and m arkdown m oney is im plemented between the manufacturer and the retailer. The manufacturer will offer the retailer compensation for the leftover after the selling reason. Results indicate that stra tegic consumer behavior will reduce the profit of supply chai n and price g uarantees policy can alleviate the s trategic consumers'waiting behavior rather than elim inating it. In addition, with the existence of strategic consum ers, combined contract of wholesale price a nd m arkdown m oney can partly incr ease the pro fit of retailer and lessen the adverse ef fect caused by strateg ic consumers'waiting behavior.(2) Promotion is introd uced to the research of strategic consum er be havior and a newsboy model consisting of one seller, and a group of strategi c consumers is considered. The sellers improve the consum ers'valuations for the products by promotional m easures before the start of the selling season. The sellers can raise the price in full-price period and increase the optim al order quantity in pr oper conditions, which are all owing to promotional effect.