Publications
Marketing research on product-harm crises: A review, managerial implications, and an agenda for future research KU Leuven
© 2017, Academy of Marketing Science. A product-harm crisis is a discrete event in which products are found to be defective and therefore dangerous to at least part of the product’s customer base. Product-harm crises are not only dangerous for consumers; they also represent a major threat to the reputation and equity of brands or companies, which often struggle with how to best respond. The marketing literature has witnessed a surge in interest ...
The Clash of the Titans: On Retailer and Manufacturer Vulnerability in Conflict Delistings KU Leuven
The days of dominant manufacturers dictating the game to obedient retailers are long gone. When parties believe they have equal bargaining power, negotiations end in deadlock more frequently and result in conflict delistings wherein the manufacturers’ brands get removed from the retailers’ assortments. This might cause major sales losses as consumers are forced to change stores or brands. The authors study both parties’ vulnerabilities by ...
Regular or low fat?An investigation of the long-run impact of the first low-fat purchase on subsequent purchase volumes and calories KU Leuven
Health organizations stimulate the development of low-fat variants to fight the obesity epidemic. We examine the effectiveness of this policy by studying the short- and long-term consequences of the first low-fat purchase on subsequent purchased volume and calories. Using a structural break analysis, we show that purchases increase in the short run after the first low-fat purchase, thereby confirming the single-occasion overconsumption effect of ...
How business cycles affect the healthcare sector: A cross-country investigation KU Leuven
The long-term relationship between the general economy and healthcare expenditures has been extensively researched, to explain differences in healthcare spending between countries, but the mid-term (i.e., business-cycle) perspective has been overlooked. This study explores business-cycle sensitivity in both public and private parts of the healthcare sector across 32 countries. Responses to the business cycle vary notably, both across spending ...
Rising from the ashes: How brands and categories can overcome product-harm crises KU Leuven
Product-harm crises are omnipresent in today's marketplace. Such crises can cause major revenue and market-share losses, lead to costly product recalls, and destroy carefully nurtured brand equity. Moreover, some of these effects may spill over to nonaffected competitors in the category when they are perceived to be guilty by association. The extant literature lacks generalizable knowledge on the effectiveness of different marketing adjustments ...
Intra- and Interformat Competition Among Discounters and Supermarkets KU Leuven
The price-aggressive discount format, popularized by chains such as Aldi and Lidl, is very successful in most Western economies. Its success is a major source of concern for traditional supermarkets. Discounters not only have a direct effect on supermarkets' market shares, but they also exert considerable pressure to improve operational efficiency and/or to decrease prices. We use an empirical entry model to study the degree of intra- and ...
Weathering product-harm crises KU Leuven
To counter the negative effects of a product-harm crisis, brands hope to capitalize on their equity, and often use advertising as a communication device to regain customers’ lost trust. We study how consumer characteristics and advertising influence consumers’ first-purchase decisions for two affected brands of peanut butter following a severe Australian product-harm crisis. Both pre-crisis loyalty and familiarity are found to form an important ...