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This research provides a basis for consideration of the nature of inter-personal interaction between buyers and sellers in a marketing context. It brings together the models of business relationship development and negotiations. Modem businesses recognise that some relationships are more profitable than others. As a result, the focus is now on retention of customers, greater openness and closer relationships between organisations and agreements leading towards more mutually beneficial outcomes between partners. This emphasises the strategic importance of inter-personal relationships and, specifically, negotiation behaviour. Indeed, negotiation in marketing is a core competence which is vital to ensuring the longevity of business relationships. Despite the recognition of this, there is very little research into negotiations in the context of relationship marketing. Existing models of negotiation present a range of approaches from the extremes of the highly adversarial and competitive to integration and solution-building between the parties. Outcome success increases in importance to the negotiating parties as relationships develop into partnerships, and resource investment increases. Interpersonal interaction is characterised by exchange of information across a broad range of issues specific to the dyadic relationship. The process and nature of exchange becomes increasingly integrative. One of the significant features of this work is that of its observation and exploration of real and substantive negotiations between buyers and sellers. In order to examine the nature of interactions, this thesis develops and tests a coding mechanism applicable to real-life negotiations, supported by interview and questionnaire instruments. Negotiations have been categorised into Early, Mid and Partner stages of relational development. The findings of analyses indicate distinct patterns of negotiator behaviour at different stages of relational development. This has implications for the development of marketing theory as well as the behavioural stances adopted by individuals engaging in negotiations. Findings can aid decision-making in developing business relationships and also provide a means of recognising individual negotiator competences. This leads to more effectively targeted preparation and planning for interactions as well as skills training and, ultimately, outcome success.

This thesis explores the relationships between consumers, society and food, with the aim of understanding how individuals create self-identity through food culture. The study is based within Consumer Culture Theory, particularly the body of work considering consumers‘ identity projects and makes theoretical contribution therein. It focuses within food culture because it encompasses universal consumption which is: mundane and symbolic, social and personal, incorporates both work and pleasure and as such contains distinctive insight for consumer identity. Food consumption is also both practice and policy relevant representing the world‘s largest industry and a key governmental priority. The findings of this narrative study show that people construct self by negotiating the territory between established theoretical traditions, understanding their own identity as more nuanced than the extremis positions can suggest. The main theoretical contribution in this area is a refinement of extant models of extended-self. It considers that factors of unextended-self are uniquely configured. It finds that consumption can be both instrumental to maintaining unextended-self and a factor of extended-self in its own right and that in this second state it should be understood within a separate category distinct from sans-consumption self. It proposes that understanding how consumer culture becomes subsumed into extended-self requires examination of three distinct matters: characteristics of incorporation, means of incorporation and relevant incorporation activities. The thesis also contributes to theory upon the social antecedents of identity and consumption. It finds that personal unique constructions of family and friendship are the most enduring and directly impactful relationships. Food culture maintains these relationships while simultaneously being influenced by them and the antecedents of self-identity which they represent. It concludes with implications for social marketing which embrace the influence of niche-groups upon individuals and for food marketers to ensure opportunity for consumer identity work as part of branded relationships

The significant proportion of the poor in Indian cities who depend on street trade for their livelihoods are increasingly threatened by eviction as a result of urban development programmes implemented since the mid 1990s. Research on urban street traders (in particular) and the urban informal economy (in general) in the developing world has primarily focussed on aspects of its social and economic organisation and have treated street traders as a homogenous group with a uniform ability to claim places. In contrast, this research explores the differential intracity spatial and political processes underpinning street trade, with particular reference to their ability to occupy and defend their trading places, in the city of Bangalore in Karnataka, India. It focuses on the everyday practices and relationships of street traders and explores the role of informal networks that give rise to such differences, through a qualitative research design and a grounded theoretical strategy. It illustrates the ways in which processes specific to a locale affect street traders' ability to occupy and defend places - an aspect that is overlooked in the theories about the politics of street trade. It argues that the territorial embeddedness of street traders is critical in so far as it affects their ability to draw on a range of networks. This thesis makes a contribution to knowledge in two ways: by providing an empirical understanding of the intra-city differences in how street traders occupy and defend places from where they can trade; and at a theoretical level on the role of urban place and the politics of street trade. It concludes with a discussion of the implications of the research findings for policies relating to urban poverty and governance of urban space.

Previous research in pavement management systems in the United Kingdom has primarily concerned itself with one or other of the two maintenance "tracks" of project and network level analysis. Those systems that do combine both "tracks" adopt a micro level approach to strategic planning at the network level. This work redresses that imbalance by advancing upon previous work, in the form of System BSM and NETCOM, in the development of the Strategic Planning Model (SPM) suite of software programs. In addition, it was decided to include a maintenance standards selection process, which would take account of sociopolitical preferences in addition to economics and legislation in the decision process. This necessitated the creation of a completely new process for the selection of maintenance standards based on multiple criteria analysis (MCA). The SPM adopts a macro level approach to strategic planning, through the STRAT-2 component, while at the same time addressing the much sought after link between the project and network levels by way of the project to network interface (PNI). The PNI provides for seamless transfer of all relevant data, between STRAT-2 and the project to network level system HMS-2, thereby ensuring that detailed project level decisions are not taken in isolation but instead take account of political and economic constraints made at the network level. Conversely it ensures that global or strategic decisions are not taken without reference to the true situation of the road network under review. Maintenance standards selection is executed through the MCA component of the software. The central database (CDB), placed at the heart of the process, ensures integrity of data across the system thereby allowing the strategic decision making process, in STRAT-2, and the prioritisation process, in HMS-2, to proceed with confidence. The CDB has also been designed as a "shell" capable of being customised to the agency's requirements, however basic or advanced in the first instance. This ensures accessibility to a broad spectrum of agencies, from the highly advanced to the resource scarce. This same "shell" design also ensures sustainability of the system by providing the necessary flexibility to evolve with the agency's requirements. Finally, the SPM has been successfully trialed as part of a full scale study on the A30/A35 Exeter to Bere Regis Design Build Finance and Operate (DBFO) project. The industrial sponsor has since taken this "pilot" study forward and is currently implementing the SPM not only on its sister project, the A50 Stoke Derby DBFO, but also as a decision support tool to assist in the bidding process for the forthcoming AI (M) DBFO tender bid. In addition, the industrial sponsor is currently in the process of implementing the SPM in the "Super" Agency Area 12 in Birmingham to assist with periodic maintenance planning.

Multi-product bundles are defined as two or more different products that are available for purchase as one single product. Multi-product bundling is becoming increasingly common in the food retail market; however research to date on how consumers evaluate multi-product food bundles is limited. Therefore, food choice and product bundle choice were identified as key bodies of knowledge, to which research on this topic could contribute. The aim of the research was: "to investigate how consumers evaluate selected multi-product food bundles" and to fulfil this aim, a mixed method approach was adopted involving a preliminary in-store survey and three main studies encompassing a quantitative questionnaire study (n=452), a quantitative experiment (n= 150) and a qualitative focus group study (n=32), which included a decision-mapping exercise (n=31). In analysing the findings, a factor analysis revealed that consumers take eight factors into account when evaluating selected multi-product food bundles. The most important evaluation factors were centred on the taste and bundle components and bundle convenience. Based on a literature review, a theory-driven model for the relationships between evaluation factors and multi-product food bundle desirability was developed and successfully tested through structural equation modelling. The experiment added that constituent products included in the bundles were found to affect the evaluations to a significant degree. The focus group study underpinned the findings from the two other studies and added that multi-product food bundle evaluation processes generally were sequential and consisted of two to four evaluation stages. A combination of these findings was integrated into a comprehensive model outlining three dimensions of multi-product food bundle evaluations. This research significantly contributes to the knowledge on multi-product bundles and has generated unique information for both product developers and retailers, which could inform future promotional strategies and enable consumer research in relation to the effects of multi- product bundling in the food sector.

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This PhD submission is by publication. It is based on the premise that marketing is fundamentally changing and evolving as a result of the impact of new technology. The conceptual ideas for the research emanated in 1998 and provided the basis for exploration until 1992. From wide ranging research it was found that company distribution strategies were changing as a result of the utilisation of cybermediaries. The Internet offers a cheaper and more radical marketing channel for smaller companies that can offer direct shipping to customers. In terms of undertaking research it was found that research on the Internet posed many problems that were related to individual skill sets, privacy considerations and the extent of email usage, including defunct email addresses. Company marketing effectiveness on the web depends on web capabilities that were identified and also the degree of co-ordination with designers. Companies also adopted reactive, interactive or passive marketing strategies depending on the time that they were in the Internet. Increasingly companies are also using the Internet for PR purposes. To this extent the accepted marketing paradigm of the four Ps is changing irrevocably. The diverse range of research methodologies, reflecting the post modern age and the limitations of the range of research is discussed. The thesis concludes by discussing how ethical marketing, customer relationship management (CRM), reputation and wireless communication are likely to change marketing strategies even further in the future.

Cette thèse s’intéresse aux circuits courts alimentaires et notamment à ceux de proximité. Ils présentent en effet une performance économique, sociale et environnementale contrastée qu’il semble par conséquent possible d’améliorer, en particulier grâce à la fonction logistique. Nous cherchons donc à comprendre ce qui détermine la performance de ces organisations logistiques et comment elle peut être améliorée au regard de ces déterminants. Démontrant l’incomplétude de la théorie économique standard face à ce questionnement, nous mobilisons un cadre théorique basé sur l’Économie de la Proximité et celle des Conventions. Ce travail montre que les logiques à l’œuvre dans ces circuits alimentaires, notamment ceux de proximité, ne sont que partiellement alternatives à celles d’autres types de circuits courts, dont ceux non-alimentaires et / ou de grande distribution. Ils s’inscrivent en effet également dans plusieurs mondes de production, dont les caractéristiques et la convention de performance associée déterminent l’organisation logistique et sa performance. Ils restent de plus soumis à des impératifs de bonne circulation des flux, notamment de produits. Ils vont donc mobiliser ou envisager des outils d’amélioration de la performance non-nécessairement alternatifs à ceux des autres circuits, qui ne sont toutefois pas toujours adaptés à la taille de la firme et son territoire. Il ressort que la coordination – horizontale et verticale - entre firmes, qui pourrait constituer un levier majeur, est peu mobilisée. Il y a donc un réel besoin d’actions en la matière avec toutefois un ajustement à la variété de logiques rencontrées et donc de besoins de coordination. / Many studies have shown the need for improvement of the global performance of short food supply chains. Logistics appears to be one of the solutions to reach this goal. We thus try to understand which are the key drivers of performance of these supply chains and what could be done to improve it, considering these key drivers. Considering that standard theory, based on neo-classical principals, can’t properly answer these questions, we use a framework based on Economics of Conventions and Economics of Proximity. This PhD demonstrates that the logics behind logistics schemes of short food supply chains – including those bases on a strong reduction of geographical and relational distances – aren’t always different from the logics of other types of chains. They actually are embedded in different worlds of production whose characteristics and convention of performance determine the logistic scheme and its performance. Moreover, as other supply chains, they have to face an important need for fast and efficient circulation of flows. To reach their goals, they will thus employ tools that aren’t necessarily different from those used in other kinds of supply chains. But these means of improvement don’t always fit the actual stakes because of the size of the firms and the characteristics of the territories in which they are embedded. Coordination between firms – horizontal or vertical – is rarely used to improve performance and is even often considered as impossible to build. But it is, as a matter of fact, one the most relevant means of improvement that could be used. To do so, a real effort has to be done to promote this kind of solution, for example through public policies.