Linnaeus University, School of Management and Economics, 5FE00E, Spring 2010 Author: Hana Hulthén Tutor: Helena Forslund Title: Information integration between retailers and manufacturers in Swedish food retail supply chains; The manufacturers’ perspective.  Background: According to study conducted by Brege in 2007, in Swedish food retail supply chains there is lack of external integration between retailers/wholesalers and manufacturers. This fact indicates that there are gaps in information integration between them which have consequences mainly for the manufacturers. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to describe gaps, from the manufacturers´ perspective, in the information integration between Swedish retailers/wholesalers and manufacturers, and analyze what are the consequences of these gaps for manufacturers as well as propose how these gaps can be alleviated. Method: Multiple - case study as research method has been applied. Specifically, three case companies, Swedish meat manufacturers, have been selected. Three one-hour long focused interviews combined with open-ended interviews have been conducted with two sales managers and one sales representative. The empirical evidence has been analyzed by using cross-case analysis method and pattern-matching method.   Results, conclusion: Firstly, Swedish meat manufacturers do not have access to real-time demand or POS data on store level. Instead, they receive orders from retailers based on updated demand forecast. As manufacturers do not have perfect demand information it leads to information asymmetry between retailers and manufacturers. As a consequence of inaccurate demand signal processing a Bullwhip effect can occur. Implementation of integrated information systems using EDI for exchange of POS data could solve the gap. However, small-scaled manufacturers have neither enough resources nor incentives to invest in an expensive business-to-business system. Furthermore, manufacturers with restricted production flexibility cannot utilize provided information on very detailed level; such as POS data. Thus, in these cases implementation of integrated information systems seems not to be reasonable. Secondly, it has been found that information integration between retailers and manufacturers has been significantly improved the last three or four years. The Swedish retailers are willing to provide information to manufacturers. Future Work: The result of this thesis is based only on findings from meat manufacturers. Other sectors could be also included as well as opinion of retailers and wholesalers to identify common problems related to information integration in Swedish food retail supply chains.

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<p><strong>Introduction </strong>As the world is becoming increasingly integrated, many firms search for partners overseas with hope to find benefits. Internationalization is today the industrial norm, and in this new and ever-expanding environment, international purchasing has become a major challenge that firms have to face in their daily operations. Yet, despite the growing importance of international purchasing by retailers, previous studies have mainly focused on international purchasing by manufacturing firms, and as the authors have acknowledge the retailers' significance on the national markets, a gap has been identified.</p><p><strong>Purpose </strong>The purpose of this thesis is to examine and map out the current state of Swedish retailers' international purchasing activities.</p><p><strong>Method </strong>In order to fulfill the purpose, a quantitative research was chosen. In total, 74 telephone interviews have been conducted, resulting in a response rate of 80 percent. The sample was based on the 120 largest retailers in Sweden, with regards to turnover.</p><p><strong>Conclusion </strong>Swedish retailers have been grouped into four distinctive clusters; the Veterans, the Freshmen, the Cravens, and the Intellectuals. Each cluster showed clear and specific characteristics that distinguished them from each other. One common feature existed; regarding what risks that were connected with international purchasing. Almost everyone highlighted the loss of control, due to long distances, as being the main risk with international purchasing. The different clusters had diverse suggestions for how to overcome this; the Veterans focused on long-term relationship-building, the Freshmen spread their purchasing activities on multiple suppliers, the Cravens contracted trade companies to take the risk, and the Intellectuals invested in a high level of integration among all actors involved.</p>

Introduction As the world is becoming increasingly integrated, many firms search for partners overseas with hope to find benefits. Internationalization is today the industrial norm, and in this new and ever-expanding environment, international purchasing has become a major challenge that firms have to face in their daily operations. Yet, despite the growing importance of international purchasing by retailers, previous studies have mainly focused on international purchasing by manufacturing firms, and as the authors have acknowledge the retailers' significance on the national markets, a gap has been identified. Purpose The purpose of this thesis is to examine and map out the current state of Swedish retailers' international purchasing activities. Method In order to fulfill the purpose, a quantitative research was chosen. In total, 74 telephone interviews have been conducted, resulting in a response rate of 80 percent. The sample was based on the 120 largest retailers in Sweden, with regards to turnover. Conclusion Swedish retailers have been grouped into four distinctive clusters; the Veterans, the Freshmen, the Cravens, and the Intellectuals. Each cluster showed clear and specific characteristics that distinguished them from each other. One common feature existed; regarding what risks that were connected with international purchasing. Almost everyone highlighted the loss of control, due to long distances, as being the main risk with international purchasing. The different clusters had diverse suggestions for how to overcome this; the Veterans focused on long-term relationship-building, the Freshmen spread their purchasing activities on multiple suppliers, the Cravens contracted trade companies to take the risk, and the Intellectuals invested in a high level of integration among all actors involved.

Background: As the link between end customers and suppliers, retailers are directly facing the end customers’ demand and meanwhile affected by suppliers’ performance. The integration and recognition of information exchange between a retailer and its supplier is significant for a retailer to operate its business effectively and efficiently. To achieve an effective and efficient retail supply chain, it is necessary to ivestigate and understand in a retailer-supplier interface, what information is given and required by a retailer, what benefits a retailer can obtain from this information exchange as well as what challenges a retailer may face. Purpose: The purpose is to investigate types of information between a retailer and its supplier, and the included benefits and challenges with the information exchange from the retailer’s perspective. Method: This thesis is a descriptive-exploratory study with an abductive approach and a qualitative method. The theoretical framework was built based on relevant previous research and the empirical data was collected from nine semi-structured interviews. A multiple-holistic case study strategy was applied, in which five retail companies were involved. Both theoretical framework and empirical data are strongly connected to the research purpose and research questions. Conclusion: It is clear that there is a great recognition of information exchange between a retailer and its supplier. By analyzing empirical findings, three summary tables regarding the research questions were developed. Some categories are in line with the theoretical framework, while some others were identified from empirical findings. To sum up, eleven types of information, thirteen categories of benefits, and nine categories of challenges with information exchange have been identified from the retailer’s perspective. Future research: The future research can further: 1. Focus on one specific retail sector; 2. Study offline, online retailers separately; 3. Focus on service retailers; 4. Focus on retailers’ inter-organizational communication; 5. Study from the supplier’s perspective; and 6. Develop solutions dealing with the supply chain, or the inter-organizational complexity.

<p><strong>Introduction:</strong> The retail market in the 21^st century will be determined on how quickly and efficiently the retailer can respond to shifts in consumer demands. Due to the physical environment of the store (store value) and the interaction with the consumer (shopping trip value), the local retail store has the advantage of generating this tangible and intangible information. It is then of importance that this information will be transferred towards the retailer, who has the opportunity to use this information and generate it into outputs that can be used as negoitables; this value creation process is an unique success indicator for creating a value network within retail supply chain.</p><p><strong>Purpose:</strong> The aim of this research is to present an understanding on the value creation process in the grocery retail chain.</p><p><strong>Methodology:</strong> Having an inductive nature, this thesis tried to bring a new understanding on value creation in grocery retail business, by using hermeneutics as a methodology approach. For empirical study, the qualitative approach was used. Data was collected through open-ended interviews with representatives in grocery retail chains.</p><p><strong>Conclusion:</strong> The main players in the value network were determined in a grocery retail chain as retailer, local retail store and other stores in the chain; and the suppliers. An intensive value exchange between the retail store and the retailer was found and following that, it was concluded that the retailer converts the value input from the local retail store into tangible and intangible value outputs towards suppliers. Combining the conclusions, the research defines that a value network is existing, but on a very low level. But more to the point, the study shows the importance of value creation by the retail chain, and that creating the possibility to share information about products, in-store experience, consumer knowledge, and consumer requirements is one of the biggest advantage the grocery retail chain has to develop this value network further.</p><p> </p>

Problem: While global IT competition is becoming increasingly severe, various business organizations and companies, in order to maximize the profit and gain market competitiveness, are in urgent need of high-performance workflow systems to improve efficiency. However, the workflow systems that are currently used are embedded with fixed business rules that cannot be easily adjusted by users, resulting in the inability of users to make adjustments to the business rules, so as to satisfy changed requirements and deal with high cost of business management and low efficiency. Therefore, it is highly desirable for users of workflow systems, especially retail supply chain companies, to employ a new type of systems that can be easily adjusted by end users themselves when required.Solution: The rule-based workflow system architecture for the management of retail supply chain business process is recommended. In such architecture, the business rules can be separated from the system logic and managed by users via a friendly interface. The rule-based workflow systems can greatly enhance the system efficiency and lower maintenance cost, as compared with the traditional workflow system or other similar information systems. And the efficiency of retail supply chain business process management can be greatly enhanced by employing rule-based workflow systems.Methods: Two main research problems and four sub-research problems, which serve as the guidance to conduct related research work, have been identified. The research work has been divided into the theoretical part and the empirical part. In the theoretical part, the theory of rule base establishment and rule-based workflow system architecture are discussed. In the empirical part, data analysis as well as prototype design are conducted by employing both quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection. Attempts are also made to verify the theories suggested in the theoretical part by means of empirical research. Based on both theoretical and empirical research, attempts are made to find solutions to the research questions. In general, this thesis arms at providing references for the future research related to rule-based workflow system management in retail supply chain management. The thesis also aims to provide references for the practical use of rule-based systems in the retail supply chain field with such issues as system development and maintenance, especially for the system of complex and changeable business processes. Most importantly, some solutions are offered to the challenges of retail supply chain management. / Program: Magisterutbildning i informatik

Introduction: The retail market in the 21st century will be determined on how quickly and efficiently the retailer can respond to shifts in consumer demands. Due to the physical environment of the store (store value) and the interaction with the consumer (shopping trip value), the local retail store has the advantage of generating this tangible and intangible information. It is then of importance that this information will be transferred towards the retailer, who has the opportunity to use this information and generate it into outputs that can be used as negoitables; this value creation process is an unique success indicator for creating a value network within retail supply chain. Purpose: The aim of this research is to present an understanding on the value creation process in the grocery retail chain. Methodology: Having an inductive nature, this thesis tried to bring a new understanding on value creation in grocery retail business, by using hermeneutics as a methodology approach. For empirical study, the qualitative approach was used. Data was collected through open-ended interviews with representatives in grocery retail chains. Conclusion: The main players in the value network were determined in a grocery retail chain as retailer, local retail store and other stores in the chain; and the suppliers. An intensive value exchange between the retail store and the retailer was found and following that, it was concluded that the retailer converts the value input from the local retail store into tangible and intangible value outputs towards suppliers. Combining the conclusions, the research defines that a value network is existing, but on a very low level. But more to the point, the study shows the importance of value creation by the retail chain, and that creating the possibility to share information about products, in-store experience, consumer knowledge, and consumer requirements is one of the biggest advantage the grocery retail chain has to develop this value network further.

In recent years, the concept of sustainability has increased of importance and customers today are more aware of the implications of not being sustainable. As of the increased awareness, customers are demanding more sustainable practices from retailers, which leads to them communicating this further down the supply chain. Therefore, the purpose of this thesis has been to examine and understand how retailers together with their suppliers in the furniture and interior retail industry co-create a more sustainable supply chain through the Corporate Social Responsibility framework, and to identify what kind of facilitators and barriers that appear in co-creation of CSR between buyers and suppliers. The empirical findings were obtained using a qualitative multiple case study of seven furniture and interior retailers originated from Sweden through semi-structured interviews. The findings were then analyzed and discussed with the presented literature to identify how they were similar or different. The conclusion of this thesis shows that buyers somewhat are engaged in co-creation with their suppliers, although there is no unified answer for how, as the level of involvement, why involved and in which function they are involved are highly different among the cases. A common theme throughout the findings indicated that the more responsible the company is, the more developed they are in their buyer-supplier relationships. Although, the co-creation level of a relationship was found to be ambiguous due to its unexplored nature of the B2B market. Furthermore, the thesis identified both some general and more specific facilitators and barriers that could be used as a guide for future co-creating activities for the implemewntation of CSR in the retail supply chain.

In the last few decades, new vertically integrated players have appeared in the fashion industry providing their customers with lower prices and an increased number of seasons per year. In this context, the need for high efficiency levels among the fast fashion retailers appears as a necessity to survive. Since the area of Store Operations (SO) is directly dealing with processes at the end of the supply chain, boosting revenues through the increased efficiency and incorporation of new technologies in this area becomes critical. In order to accomplish that in a long-term perspective, this must be done while improving staff working conditions, customer experience in the stores and with more cost effective practices. Therefore, this study investigated how established fast fashion retailers can improve their Store Operations in pursuance of coping with growing efficiency requirements and rapidly changing technology in their stores. This has been done by conducting a case study at one of the biggest fast fashion retailers in the world. The research involved 42 different interviews with the case company’s employees and industry experts in the store solutions field, which allowed collecting both qualitative and quantitative data. Moreover, in order to analyze empirical findings obtained during the research process, outsourcing theories, including transactional cost theory (TCT) and resource-based view theory (RBV) as well as innovation theories, including diffusion of innovation and radio frequency identification (RFID) adoption theories, were used. The results indicate that in order to improve their Store Operations, the case company should first work on five areas, which include: (1) stockroom processes, (2) technology and innovation, (3) alarm systems, (4) employee morale, and (5) customer service. At the same time, it was discovered that the solutions that can improve all of these areas are: RFID that act as a security device and the outsourcing of stockroom process, known as Golden Delivery. In order to make the implementation of these two solutions successful, separate implementation guidelines must be created, both of which are presented in this document. The findings of this study have implications on both sustainability and research. This investigation contributes to the literature by giving a better understanding of the operational activities performed in the store environment of fast fashion retailers as well as the link between them and the rest of the supply chain. Moreover, the efficiency solutions presented in this document give fashion retailers a sustainable economic advantage achieved through cost savings and increased business performance, as well as, the motivation to focus on social and environmental aspects related to these practices.