Perishable Products Supply Chain Research Based On Risk Preference

In reality, the decision makers of perishable products supply chain often have their risk attitude when they make decisions, and most literature are based on the hypothesis that decision makers are risk-neutral,and have been ignored the existence of the consumer strategy behavior,this leads to large deviation between research and reality situation. In order to improve the overall effectiveness of perishable products supply chain and help decision makers obtain the maximum utility with minimal resources, this article study the perishable products supply chain based on decision makers’ and strategic customers’ risk preference, research results are closer to reality and more relevant for decision makers, the main innovations are as follows:(1) compared to two level supply chain only considers suppliers and retailers or retailers and strategic customers, supply chain in paper consists of a supplier, a retailer and a group of strategic customers, such supply chain structure is closer to a complete supply chain in reality;(2) the model considers the risk preference of decision makers and strategic customers, uses the rational expectations equilibrium hypothesis to analyze the relationship between customers and the retailer, prospect theory is used to describe the loss aversion preference, relative to the neutral hypothesis, these constraint conditions make the model more conform to reality;(3) the centralized supply chain as a optimization of benchmarking to decentralized supply chain, its importance is self-evident. General literature assume that the centralized supply chain is risk-neutral, and don’t consider the existence of the strategic customer. When the centralized and decentralized supply chain have the same constraints, the centralized supply chain optimal performance can be referent andcomparable. Therefore, modeling centralized supply chain considers risk preference and the existence of the strategic customers.(4) The wholesale price contract can’t coordinate the supply chain in general. Through analyzing the optimal orders of decentralized and centralized supply chain, the results show that when the risk preference coefficient of centralized supply chain is greater than the retailer’s, the supply chain can achieve coordination under specific conditions.(5) Analyze the decision makers’ optimal decision under the profit sharing contract and revenue sharing contract, the results show that under two contracts, due to the existence of the strategic customer and retailer’s loss-averse preference, the retailer’s order quantity is reduced, the optimal wholesale price is higher than the condition of the equilibrium of the supply chain; retailer and supplier’ preference for the two contracts are always different, their finally expected utility and the leading position in the market will determine the choice of contract.