Bricks vs. Clicks: Which is better for marketing remanufactured products?

W. Yan, Yu Xiong, Zhongkai Xiong, N. Guo

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

141 Citations (Scopus)
7 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

The economical and environmental benefits are the central issues for remanufacturing. Whereas extant remanufacturing research focuses primarily on such issues in remanufacturing technologies, production planning, inventory control and competitive strategies, we provide an alternative yet somewhat complementary approach to consider both issues related to different channels structures for marketing remanufactured products. Specifically, based on observations from current practice, we consider a manufacturer sells new units through an independent retailer but with two options for marketing remanufactured products: (1) marketing through its own e-channel (Model M) or (2) subcontracting the marketing activity to a third party (Model 3P). A central result we obtain is that although Model M is always greener than Model 3P, firms have less incentive to adopt it because both the manufacturer and retailer may be worse off when the manufacturer sells remanufactured products through its own e-channel rather than subcontracting to a third party. Extending both models to cases in which the manufacturer interacts with multiple retailers further reveals that the more retailers in the market, the greener Model M relative to Model 3P.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)434-444
Number of pages11
JournalEuropean Journal of Operational Research
Volume242
Issue number2
Early online date22 Oct 2014
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 16 Apr 2015

Keywords

  • distribution channels
  • remanufacturing
  • environmental impact
  • game theory

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