Browsing by Subject "E-commerce"

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Deliver me from waste : impacts of e-commerce on food supply chain energy use
(2019-05-09) Gee, Isabella Marie; Webber, Michael E., 1971-; Apte, Joshua; Lieberknecht, Katherine; Allen, David; Faust, Kasey
An increasing portion of food is purchased online through e-commerce services such as meal-kit and grocery delivery. As these services change the way food is purchased and distributed, they also impact how energy is used along the food supply chain. Impacts will differ based on type of service, location, and consumer habits. In particular, meal-kit and grocery delivery services might impact consumer food waste, packaging waste, and energy consumption for transportation related to deliveries. This research attempts to assess the potential impact of food delivery services to energy use along the entire food supply chain, accounting for food loss and waste. An analytical model was developed to compare the energy requirements of meal-kit delivery systems to conventional grocery shopping. Meal-kit services can reduce food waste because the kits pre-portion ingredients for each recipe, thereby saving energy. However, the supply chain and packaging requirements of meal-kit delivery are different than for grocery stores, potentially offsetting any reduction of food waste. Furthermore, if meal-kit delivery replaces some trips to the grocery store, then transportation-related savings might be significant. Mass and energy balances were used to assess embedded energy in both pathways. The model was illustrated under representative operating conditions for a consumer in Austin, Texas using Monte Carlo simulation. Both per-meal and per-week, a meal-kit delivery service meal is more energy intensive than procuring the same meal from conventional grocery stores primarily due to single-use packaging. Consumer transportation to the grocery store was also found to be particularly energy intensive. Results also indicated that there might be a greater potential to reduce energy use when consumers live further from a grocery store. A second analytical model was developed to compare the energy requirements of grocery delivery services to grocery shopping. Two types of grocery delivery services were considered: decentralized (store-centric) and centralized (warehouse-centric). The supply chains for both store- and warehouse-centric grocery delivery services also differ from conventional grocery shopping, and might offset changes in food waste. Store-centric grocery delivery services primarily affect last-mile transportation by replacing a personal trip with a delivery, though they might be able to reduce energy by bundling multiple orders together in one trip. Warehouse-centric grocery delivery services might have a greater impact on energy use because they set up their own separate supply chain with primary fulfillment centers and delivery vehicles. Mass and energy balances were used to assess embedded energy per-week in both pathways. The model was illustrated under two consumer case studies using Monte Carlo simulation. In both cases, the warehouse-centric grocery delivery service was the least energy intensive. The store-centric grocery delivery service showed slight energy savings. Results suggest that consumer transportation and retail energy use are the two major contributing factors to relative energy intensity between scenarios. Results also indicated that grocery delivery services might be able to save more energy for consumers that live further away from a grocery store. For all food purchase pathways analyzed, consumer last-mile transportation (the last leg of the supply chain before food reaches a consumer) was found to be particularly energy intensive. Additionally, results suggested that food delivery services might be able to save more energy for rural consumers. To build off of these findings, a hybrid agent-based and discrete-event simulation modelling framework was developed to capture the last-mile transportation energy use of food delivery services for rural consumers. The framework operates in a geographic information system (GIS) space and tracks per-trip energy use of a delivery van and delivery car operating in a sample neighborhood in west Austin, TX. A sensitivity analysis was performed to gauge the impact of vehicle speed and number of orders fulfilled on per-trip energy use. In general, the delivery van trip was always more energy intensive than the delivery car over the range of values studied. However, results indicated that there is a theoretical threshold based on consumer demand and density that dictates when van- or car-based delivery is energetically preferable. Taken together, this body of work provides methods for evaluating the farm-to-fork energy impacts of food delivery services, with particular attention to last-mile transportation.
The influence of live customer service on consumers' likelihood of disclosing personal information
(2014-05) Li, Dan, active 21st century; Eastin, Matthew S.
Live customer service has been used by many e-commerce brands as a method to gain consumers personal information. Previous research has found that live service agents have a positive influence on consumer perceived service quality and trust. This research aims to examine if certain type of live customer service generate better website and brand perceptions from the consumer and ultimately help in gaining consumer personal information. Results of this experimental design show that avatar selection and exposure did not significantly differ for service quality, trust, attitudes, purchase intention, and likelihood of disclosing personal information. It was also found that customers have a significant likelihood of selecting agents of the same gender.
Playing with music while shopping online : the effects of interactive music on consumer engagement and behavioral intention
(2018-05) Hwang, Hsing-Chi; Oh, Jeeyun
The current study investigates the potential of applying interactive music to the design of e-commerce website in order to create more engaging consumer experience. Through a single-factor experiment with three conditions (the control condition without background music, the static background music condition, the interactive background music condition), behavioral and attitudinal data were collected via Google Analytics and a self-report questionnaire (N = 251). We found that consumers in the interactive music condition were more affectively engaged in the shopping task, regarding the website more novel due to its perceived vividness. This enhanced engagement led to more positive brand attitudes and perceptions and increased users’ behavioral intention to purchase. Additionally, three moderators were found crucial to predict the target audience profile for application of interactive music – existing attitudes of users toward online shopping, price and web features as purchase decision-making factors.
The Role of Physical Retail Stores in a Digital, Post-Pandemic World, Do Old Habits Die Hard?
(2023-04) Eisler, Benjamin
We live in a dynamic retail environment. COVID forced retailers to adapt to new consumer behaviors quickly and develop robust omnichannel fulfillment infrastructures— meaning that online and offline channels had to be integrated. Today, e-commerce offerings are more robust than ever, and customers have more choices than ever regarding how they shop. Considering this dynamic environment, I have several questions about how retailers can persuade consumers, who became accustomed to e-commerce during the pandemic, to return to their stores. Furthermore, I am interested in evaluating retailers’ strategies to make their physical retail stores more appealing. Despite the growth of e-commerce and the ongoing pandemic, some American consumers expressed a desire to return to shopping in physical retail stores. According to a 2021 report, 57% of US adults “expressed excitement” to return to in-person shopping 1. Today’s retail environment is uncharted territory. Consumers have more channel options than ever before. Retailers have made significant changes because of the pandemic, which has rapidly accelerated digital transformation. My research examined whether customers who became accustomed to online shopping during the pandemic returned to physical retail stores. Through in-depth interviews with retail executives and managers, ethnographies, and a questionnaire, I sought to understand whether customers are returning to stores and to discern which strategies and decisions have been effective for persuading customers to return to stores and demonstrate loyalty towards a brand. My findings reveal that while some customers became accustomed to the convenience of online shopping, after realizing they could fulfill their needs without visiting stores, many customers longed to return to physical retail stores, and are shopping in stores, like how they behaved during the pandemic. My findings also revealed that consumers’ desires to visit stores vary by industry and shopping occasion. Additionally, many customers who use digital technology and e-commerce also value being able to visit the stores for returns, interact with merchandise, and seek out expert advice. While my questionnaire findings did not provide significant insights into how the pandemic changed behavior, they provide insight into how consumers choose between shopping online or in person for certain occasions. Ultimately, my findings provide a basis for further research on how retailing has changed because of the pandemic and omnichannel transformation.
The efficacy of social media influencers in e-commerce in the context of sensory richness
(2021-05-05) Zhuo, Shuer; Eastin, Matthew S.
Emerging affordances of social media platforms and e-commerce interfaces have enticed brands, marketers, and social media influencers to employ rich media in hopes of engaging consumers with multisensory stimuli. Using Media Richness Theory, this study explores how media richness regarding sensory modalities in influencers’ product reviews affects decision confidence and behavioral intentions during online shopping. Further, the study investigates the interaction effects between media richness and motivation on consumers’ sensation of presence in e-commerce and the relationships among presence, attention, curiosity, search, decision confidence, and purchase intention. Results show that presence and search significantly predict decision confidence, which was found to have a positive association with purchase intention. Data also reveal that attention and curiosity are positively associated with presence and significantly predict search.