Research On Pricing Strategies Of Dual-channel Supply Chains Considering Consumers' Channel Preferences

With the development of electronic commerce,more and more manufacturers and retailers open their own e-channels in addition to the traditional retail channels,named as the dual channels.The partners of the dual-channel supply chain are faced with the heterogeneous consumers and channel competition,so they need consider channel selection and pricing strategy in the uncertain market.Taking this as a point of departure,this dissertation applies game theory to investigate the problem of pricing decisions considering heterogeneous consumers' channel preferences.The main context and contributions are concluded in the following.First,the manufacturer dual-channel model and the retailer dual-channel model are compared in a unified framework from the manufacturer's and the retailer's perspective,using the traditional single-channel supply chain as a benchmark.The models incorporate consumers' lower valuation of the product sold through the echannel and the discounted prices available in these channels.Stackelberg games are applied to obtain the optimal equilibrium solutions of the two models.Our analysis indicates that the retailer is reluctant to introduce the Internet channel even though the manufacturer gives the chance to her in some cases.The discount rate and consumer acceptance have completely opposite effects on the supply chain strategies(prices,demand and profits).Second,both the manufacturer and the retailer introduce the e-channel in addition to the traditional physical channel.We find that if the Internet channel is introduced,the manufacturer's ability to control the channels and the wholesale price and the profits all will be enhanced;the retailer will reduce the retail price when the proportion of demand for the retailer's Internet channel is less and vice versa.Third,the pricing decision of a dual-channel supply chain is investigated,in which consists of one risk-averse manufacturer and one risk-neutral retailer.Based on the consumers' channel preferences,the consumers are classified into two types: grocery shoppers and Internet shoppers.Then,using mean-variance method and Stackelberg game theoretic analysis,we examine the optimal equilibrium pricing under the dual-channel model.The results indicate when the factor of the manufacturer risk averse attitude is in a certain range,two wholesale prices are obtained to make the manufacturer win the optimal profit.By analyzing the solutions,we find that when the manufacturer adopts the low wholesale price,it will benefit the retailer,the consumers and the entire supply chain.The larger the proportion of the grocery shoppers,the more the increment of supply chain's profits by adjusting the factor of the risk averse attitude.Fourth,the pricing decision of a dual-channel supply chain is investigated,in which consists of one risk-neutral manufacturer and one risk-averse retailer.When the factor of the retailer risk averse attitude is in a certain range,both the total profits and the manufacturer's profits will be improved,and the retailer's profits will be improved only in some cases.Both the demands of the physical channel and that of the Internet channel will increase.It will benefit the retailer,the consumers and the entire supply chain if the retailer is risk averse appropriately.Finally,the pricing decision of a dual-channel supply chain is investigated,in which consists of one risk-averse manufacturer as a Stackelberg leader and one riskaverse retailer as a follower.According to the risk attitudes of the partners,the decision is divided into four scenarios: the decision that has nothing to do with the attitude of the partners' risk averse,the decision that is only related to the attitude of the manufacturer's risk averse,the decision that is only related to the attitude of the retailer's risk averse,the decision that is related to the attitude of both partners' risk averse.Taking the decision that has nothing to do with the attitude of the partners' risk averse as the benchmark,the cases will be obtained that one partner or both the partners' profits be improved.The research shows that there exist pricing strategies that can improve the supply chain' profit when the decisions are influenced by the risk attitude of one or both manufacturers and retailers.