How were work identities of female and male shop assistants in the clothing departments at NK constructed, and how did this change over time? The starting point of this thesis has been that identities are contextually constructed. Focus has been set on trying to understand how the process of ‘making’ identity has been done in a historical perspective for shop assistants in clothing departments at the department store NK, AB Nordiska Kompaniet, in Stockholm. Shared narratives are crucial in the process of making collective identities. This thesis analyses narratives on relations between shop assistants and the company, the trade union and the commodities that were sold. The results show that the constructions of work identities, besides from being an ongoing process, have been characterized by a constantly ongoing struggle about expectations on their nature. The perspective is both discursive and materialistic. NK had approximately 2000 employees. All these people could not have personal relations to each other. To create an imagined community and a sense of collective identity, common narratives were important. The employees were in the company’s internal narrative named the ‘NK-ists’. It was said to be important to work in the ‘NK- spirit’. Narratives outside the NK-collective did effect the imagined community within, sometimes causing the collective to join closer together and sometimes dividing it. Work identities and the gendered division of labour are connected. Notions of gender and of what kind of work that is considered to be suitable to men or women at different times and in different places colour the narratives that construct work identities. The narratives dealt with in this thesis originate in existing events and in myths about the department store NK, and the shop assistants working at NK had to relate to these. The employer had picked one group of employees for whom this was especially true: the shop assistants. They were told: “You are NK”.

Abstrakt Titel: Leksaker i den digitala tidsåldern – Leksaksbranschens bemötande av nya preferenser Författare: Sandra Nilsson och Victor Tydesjö Handledare: Leif Rytting Kurs: Företagsekonomi III – examensarbete 15 hp. Linnéuniversitetet VT 2014 Syfte Vårt syfte med uppsatsen är att undersöka hur leksaksbranschen har förändrat och kommer att förändra sin verksamhet i den teknologiska tidsåldern. För att genomföra detta har vi fastställt några aspekter att undersöka: Butikernas nuvarande tillstånd gällande sortiment och arbetssätt Förändringar som har skett gällande sortiment som en konsekvens av barns förändrade teknologianvändning Leksaksbranschens framtid som en följd av den fortsatta teknologiutvecklingen Forskningsfrågan lyder: Hur påverkas leksaksbranschen av barns tidiga användande av olika former av digital teknologi? Metod Vi har för denna uppsats valt att använda den kvalitativa metoden. Detta för att på ett djupt sätt kunna få specifik data om branschens företeelser. Undersökningen har genomförts med en abduktiv ansats, där vald teori har format empirin men där empiri även har inverkat på den teori som presenteras. Det teoretiska materialet har präglats av akademisk litteratur och elektroniska källor. Empiriinsamlingen skedde genom kvalitativa intervjuer med fyra leksaksbutiker och en representant från branschorganisationen Leksaksbranschen. Slutsatser Gällande branschens nuläge framkom att inköp på speciella inköpsmässor för leksakshandlare och deras leverantörer bär stor betydelse för leksaksbutiker och inverkar även på utformning av deras sortiment. Samordning mellan mindre aktörer i en enda katalog föreslås vara ett sätt för de mindre starka butikerna att hävda sig bättre mot de stora kedjorna. Vi fann att lekåldern har minskat, vilket medför att barn är kunder under en kortare tid. Vissa sortimentsanpassningar har skett på grund av detta, men inte i särskilt stor skala. Gällande branschens framtid tydliggörs att aktörerna kan behöva göra vissa förändringar i sin verksamhet, där exakt vad detta skulle vara inte är självklart. / Abstract Our purpose with this study is to investigate how the toy industry has changed and will change its operations in the technological era. In order to do this, we determined a few aspects to investigate: The toy stores’ current state regarding assortment and ways of working Changes that have occurred regarding assortment as a consequence of children’s’ changed technological usage The future of the toy industry as a result of the continued technological development The research question goes as follows: How is the toy industry impacted by children’s early usage of different kinds of digital technology? In this study we decided to use the qualitative research method in order to gather profound and specific data about the happenings of the toy industry. The study has been carried out with an abductive methodology, allowing theoretical data to impact empirical data and also allowing empirical data to impact theoretical data. The theoretical data is characterized by usage of academic literature and electronic sources. The empirical data gathering was carried out by qualitative interviews with four toy stores as well as a representative from the Swedish toy industry association. Regarding the current state of the industry, it showed that purchasing at special toy dealer’s purchasing fairs is of significant importance for toy stores and also impacts the shaping of their assortments. Coordination between smaller actors in one single toy catalog is proposed as a way for the less powerful stores to assert themselves against large toy chains. We found that children stop playing with toys at an earlier age, which means that children are customers during a shorter time span. Certain assortment adaptations have happened due to this, but not in a very significant manner. Regarding the future of the industry it is conveyed that the actors may have to perform certain changes in their operations, but precisely what this would entail is not obvious.

The purpose of this study was to examine customer attitudes towards flagship stores and how they perceive them. To ascertain this, and obtain answers to the research questions covering the study's main issues, we decided to turn to the customers who recently visited a flagship store. Our background theory is based upon literature from previous research done on the subject in the form of scientific articles and books. We present the theoretical concept that explains how flagship stores are used as a marketing tool and what impact they have on the new market. These will be helpful in answering our questions when we evaluate our results.! A theoretical framework, consisting of three value dimensions, was used as a support throughout the implementation of the study. These three values; hedonic, practical and social, should give us a better idea of what customers experience and what they value when they visit the flagship stores.! The method used in our investigation is of quantitative form, so that it can be feasible on a large crowd to thus contribute to a quantitative result. A questionnaire consisting of closed questions with given answer options on a Likert-scale was distributed to a few selected stores, all located along Stockholm’s most fashionable shopping streets - Gant, H&M Man, Asics and J. Lindeberg. ! The result that we have reached is that customers both value and experience the practical value dimensions more than the hedonic and social ones and that flagship stores are a successful marketing concept. This since the majority of the customers have a positive opinion about them as well as feeling that the experience in the stores have provided them with a more positive view of the brand - which is a direct contributor to the increasing CBBE of the company. / Syftet med den här uppsatsen var att undersöka kunders attityder gentemot flaggskeppsbutiker och hur de upplevde dessa som koncept. För att ta reda på detta valde vi att vända oss till de kunder som besökt just sådana butiker för att få svar på de frågor som kan vara till hjälp för att bemöta studiens huvudsakliga frågeställningar.! Teorin bygger på litteratur av tidigare forskning som gjorts i ämnet i form av vetenskapliga artiklar och böcker. Vi presenterar de teoretiska koncept som förklarar hur flaggskeppsbutikerna använts och vilken betydelse de har på den nya markanden. Dessa kom att vara till hjälp vid besvarandet av våra frågeställningar då vi på så sätt utvärderar våra resultat och ser vad dem säger oss. ! Som stöd under vårt genomförande av denna undersökning förhöll vi oss till ett teoretiskt ramverk bestående av de tre värdedimensionerna. Dessa tre värden, de hedoniska, praktiska och sociala, gav oss en bättre uppfattning och förtydligade vad kunderna upplevde och egentligen värdesätter när de besöker flaggskeppsbutiker.! Den metod vi använde oss av för att gå tillväga med vår undersökning var av kvantitativ form där vi lät respondenter svara på en enkät som vi själva distribuerade. Enkäten bestod av slutna frågor i form utav påståenden med svarsalternativ givna på en likertskala - detta för att kunna genomföra en effektiv undersökning på en stor skara och för att på så sätt få fram ett kvantitativt resultat. Följande butiker valdes ut särskilt till denna undersökning; Asics, Gant, H&M Man och J.Lindeberg, då samtliga är belägna längs Stockholms finare shoppingstråk. ! De resultat vi kommer fram till är att kunder både värderar och upplever de praktiska värdedimensionerna mer än de hedoniska och de sociala och att flaggskeppsbutiker är ett fungerande marknadsföringskoncept. Detta kan bekräftas då majoriteten av kunderna var positiva till dem och upplevde att de har en mer positiv syn på varumärket efter besöket - något som genererar ett högre CBBE till företaget.

Bibliography: leaves 347-353. / vii, 353 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of History, 1989

No description available.

No description available.

Univ., Fak. für Wirtschaftswiss., Diss.--Magdeburg, 1999. / Literaturangaben.

Thesis (M.A.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of Geography, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1959. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 368-374).

Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2000. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: European cities offer a variety of attractions, activities and facilities to tourists. One component of tourism in this urban context is cultural tourism which is a high potential growth sector within the tourism industry. Cultural tourists travel to cities mainly to see the most important and well known cultural attractions, to take part in cultural festivities, to view the cultural treasures of the cities and to attend performances and exhibitions. Other functions and activities such as retail functions and types also occur in the vicinity of the important cultural attractions of a city. Amongst these activities and functions are shops, cafés and restaurants. In an area of a city where cultural attractions and retail types coexist, the possibility exits that a spatial relationship between cultural tourism and retailing may occur in the sense that the tourists who visit these attractions may support the retail establishments in the vicinity of cultural attractions. The city of Leuven in Belgium is a typical West European city with a variety of cultural tourist attractions as well as functions which can be supportive of cultural tourism. These functions include shops, cafés and restaurants. An investigation was conducted to establish whether a spatial relationship exists between cultural tourism and retail activities in the part of Leuven known as the Ring. The geographical information systems TransCad, Arc/Info en ArcView were used for the processing and analysis of retail and cultural tourism data gathered in the Ring of Leuven. Three analytical procedures were performed separately for shops, cafés and restaurants. These procedures comprised (a) the determination of the numbers and types of supportive functions around the most important cultural-historical tourist attractions, (b) the determination of the numbers and types of supportive functions along the routes to cultural-historical sites from tourist points of origin, and (c) the determination of the numbers and types of supportive functions along guided-walk routes in the city. The analysis results show that a (spatial) relationship does exist between retail and cultural tourism in the Ring of Leuven. On average 44% of the retail functions (shops, cafés and restaurants) are located within a distance of up to saam from the six most important cultural building attractions in Leuven (procedure 1). Retail functions on guided-walk routes totalled 48% with cafés and restaurants being the most abundant (procedure 3). Only 19% of retail functions are located between points of origin and cultural building attractions (procedure 2). A more detailed study should be conducted to establish the exact nature of the spatial relationship which exists between retail and cultural tourism in the Ring of Leuven. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Europese stede bied 'n reeks attraksies, aktiwiteite en fasiliteite vir toeriste. Een komponent van die breër term toerisme in hierdie stedelike konteks is kulturele toerisme wat 'n baie sterk groeisektor binne die toerismemark is. Kulturele toeriste besoek stede hoofsaaklik met die doelom die belangrikste en bekendste kulturele attraksies te besigtig, om aan kulturele feeste deel te neem, die kunsskatte van stede te betrag en om teateropvoerings en tentoonstellings by te woon. In die nabyheid van die belangrikste kulturele attraksies van 'n stad kom ook ander funksies en aktiwiteite soos kleinhandelsfunksies en -tipes voor. Hieronder ressorteer onder andere winkels, cafés en restaurante. In die gedeelte van 'n stad waar kulturele attraksies en kleinhandelstipes naby mekaar voorkom, kan die moontlikheid bestaan van 'n ruimtelike verwantskap tussen kulturele toerisme en kleinhandel, in dié sin dat toeriste wat die attraksies besoek, moontlik ook die kleinhandelstipes wat in die nabyheid van die kulturele attraksies voorkom, salondersteun. Die stad Leuven in België is 'n tipiese voorbeeld van 'n Wes-Europese stad met 'n verskeidenheid kulturele toeriste-attraksies asook funksies wat kulturele toerisme ondersteun. Hierdie ondersteunende funksies sluit winkels, cafés en restaurante in. In die deel van Leuven wat as die Ring bekend staan, is ondersoek ingestel na die voorkoms, al dan nie, van 'n ruimtelike verwantskap tussen kulturele toerisme en kleinhandel. Die geografiese inligtingstelsels TransCad, Arc/Info en ArcView is ingespan vir die verwerking en analise van data oor kleinhandel en kulturele toerisme in die Ring van Leuven. Drie ontledingsprosedures is afsonderlk uitgevoer vir winkels, cafés en restaurante. Hierdie prosedures behels (a) die bepaling van die aantal en tipes ondersteunende funksies rondom die belangrikste kultuurhistoriese toeristeattraksies; (b) die bepaling van die aantal en tipe ondersteunende funksies langs die roetes tussen die toeriste-oorsprongpunte en die belangrikste kultuurhistoriese toeriste-attraksies; en (c) die bepaling van die aantal en tipe ondersteunende funksies langs begeleide stadswandelroetes. Die analiseresultate wys dat 'n verwantskap tussen kleinhandel en kulturele toerisme, ruimtelik-gesproke, wel in die Ring van Leuven bestaan. Só is gemiddeld 44% van die kleinhandelsfunksies (winkels, cafés en restaurante) tot op In afstand van SOOmvanaf die ses belangrikste kulturele gebou-attraksies in Leuven geleë (prosedure 1). Ook kom 48% van die kleinhandelsfunksies langs die roetes van begeleide stadswandelinge voor. Hier is dit egter die cafés en restaurante wat die grootste proporsies uitmaak (prosedure 3). 'n Gemiddelde proporsie van slegs 19% van die kleinhandelsfunksies kom tussen oorsprongpunte en die belangrikste kulturele gebou-attraksies voor. 'n Meer omvattende studie moet onderneem word om vas te stel watter tipe ruimtelike verwantskap tussen kleinhandel en kulturele toerisme binne Leuven se Ring voorkom.