Retail apocalypse has been discussed as a result of the increasing online consumption due to a digitalized society. Many researchers claim that the future of consumption will solely take place digitally, that the physical store won't have an actual function and will eventually get replaced by new appealing meeting places online. Why do companies choose to keep and newly establish physical stores in a digitalized society? Which synergies between online channels and physical stores do companies choose to use in order to create a favorable interface? By implementing qualitative semi structured interviews with five different companies, the answer to the above mentioned questions is therefore that companies that sell high engagement products tend to have a higher need of physical stores despite digitalization. Such companies consider that physical stores and online channels are complements to each other, thus one needs the other in order to perform as well as desired. Another aspect that is more achievable in physical stores compared to online channels is the cross sales aspect. Additionally, companies tend to use transparency and digitalized transitions between their different sales channels in order to achieve the highest desired results.  Therefore, the aim of this study is to add a new knowledge aspect to the already existing research in this field. That is, through shedding the light on the remaining need of physical stores for companies that sell high engagement products. Hence, this study could be summed up with the simple fact that retail apocalypse is not the ultimate truth in all situations. / Butiksdöden har länge diskuterats till följd av den ökande e-handeln som har framkommit i samband med det digitaliserade samhället. Många forskare menar att framtidens handel enbart kommer äga rum digitalt, att den fysiska butiken inte fyller någon funktion och kommer så småningom att ersättas med nya tilltalande mötesplatser online. Varför väljer då företag att bibehålla och nyetablera fysiska butiker i ett digitaliserat samhälle och vilka synergier mellan onlinekanaler och fysiska butiker använder sig företag av för att skapa ett gynnsamt samspel? Genom kvalitativa semistrukturerade intervjuer med fem olika företag kan ovannämnda frågor besvaras genom att konstatera att företag som säljer högengagemangsprodukter anser att behovet av den fysiska butiken kvarstår trots digitaliseringen. Detta då sådana företag anser att den fysiska- och den digitala verksamheten agerar komplement och därmed presterar den ena inte lika bra utan den andra. Mer försäljningen är ännu en aspekt som sker i den fysiska butiken som inte går att uppnå till samma grad genom e-handeln. Företag tillämpar även en transparens samt digitala övergångar mellan diverse försäljningskanaler för att skapa ett så gynnsamt samspel som möjligt. Syftet med denna studie är således att tillföra en kompletterande kunskapsvinkel till den redan befintliga forskningen inom området. Detta genom att belysa att företag med olika engagemangsprodukter har olika behov av en fysisk verksamhet. Därmed summeras denna studie med att butiksdöden inte är den förutsedda sanningen alla gånger.

[pt] Inúmeras mudanças no comportamento da sociedade levaram o consumidor a querer mais rapidez e conveniência em seu cotidiano. Principalmente nos grandes centros, é latente a necessidade de conciliar a tarefa de reposição dos alimentos e itens de necessidades do consumidor com as atividades do trabalho, estudo, momentos com família e lazer. Em função dessas mudanças, o varejo de conveniência é um formato que passa por transformações no Brasil, tendo como destaque as grandes redes do varejo alimentício e as distribuidoras de combustíveis representadas por suas marcas de conveniência. Neste contexto, a presente dissertação tem como objetivo identificar quais são os atributos considerados mais relevantes na escolha de uma loja de conveniência fora dos postos de combustíveis, segundo a visão dos consumidores e mensurar o grau de importância relativa atribuído a cada um deles. A condução da pesquisa ocorreu em duas etapas: uma primeira com caráter exploratório, em que foram entrevistados 17 consumidores e 6 gestores da área de conveniência, aspirando à identificação dos atributos relevantes no mercado de varejo de conveniência e seus níveis distintos; e uma segunda etapa quantitativa por meio da metodologia de análise conjunta para definir qual o grau de utilidade atribuído a cada um deles. Identificou-se como os principais atributos para escolha de uma loja de varejo de conveniência: mix de produtos, agilidade no atendimento, ambiente físico e localização. / [en] Numerous changes in society s behavior have led consumers to want more speed and convenience in their daily lives. Especially in large centers, there is a latent need to reconcile the task of replacing food and items of consumer needs with the activities of work, study, moments with family and leisure. As a result of these changes, convenience retail is a format that is undergoing transformations in Brazil, highlighting the large food retail chains and fuel distributors represented by their convenience brands. In this context, this dissertation aims to identify which attributes are considered most relevant when choosing a convenience store outside gas stations, according to the view of consumers; and measure the degree of relative importance attributed to each of them. The research was conducted in two stages: the first with an exploratory character, in which 17 consumers and 6 managers in the convenience area were interviewed, aiming to identify the relevant attributes in the convenience retail market and their different levels; and a second quantitative stage using the conjunct analysis methodology to define the degree of utility attributed to each of them. It was identified as the main attributes for choosing a convenience retail store: product mix, agility in service, physical environment and location.

The Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD) paradigm became a core principle for optimizing query processing in columnar database systems. Until now, only the LOAD/STORE instructions are considered to be efficient enough to achieve the expected speedups, while avoiding GATHER/SCATTER is considered almost imperative. However, the GATHER instruction offers a very flexible way to populate SIMD registers with data elements coming from non-consecutive memory locations. As we will discuss within this article, the GATHER instruction can achieve the same performance as the LOAD instruction, if applied properly. To enable the proper usage, we outline a novel access pattern allowing fine-grained, partition-based SIMD implementations. Then, we apply this partition-based SIMD processing to two representative examples from columnar database systems to experimentally demonstrate the applicability and efficiency of our new access pattern.

Fashion retail stores are one of the settings where technology innovation is implemented to make the in-store experience more efficient than before. One of the innovations that are becoming increasingly common is self-service checkouts. Generation Z is the upcoming and new buying force for the retailers to target and this is what has been the foundation for the orientation of this thesis. The purpose of the research has been to examine factors that influence Generation Z usage of self-service checkouts in fashion retail stores in Sweden. In order to investigate this, the authors developed six hypotheses from previous research about convenience, time efficiency, attitude towards technology, subjective norms, interaction avoidance and fear of failure. The primary data presented in the chapter for empirical findings were gained through a questionnaire where 384 respondents participated. The data was analyzed in the statistical software program SPSS in order to test the hypotheses. The findings were presented in the analysis chapter where it also was discussed with the literature to be able to identify if there were any similarities or differences. The conclusion of this thesis shows that there are different factors that are influencing Generation Z to use self-service checkouts in fashion retail stores. Convenience emerges as the strongest influencing factor, while fear of failure holds the least influence on Generation Z's intention to utilize self-service checkouts. These findings aim to assist fashion retail companies in understanding the critical considerations when implementing self-service checkouts in-store.

Finding a boot that fits comfortably in a ski rental shop can be a difficult and tedious task for many people. Having properly fitting boots is important to prevent injuries in the user and reduce the risk of accidents happening on the mountain. The goal of this master thesis was to develop a tool that could make it easier for the customers in a ski rental shop to find the right boot for them. This was done by first sending out surveys to students at LTU and Swedish rental stores and interviewing rental store staff. It was found that a lot of the students don’t want to take the time to properly test their boots in the shop and that the staff don’t feel like they have the time to properly measure and fit every customer with a proper set of boots. It was theorised that making the measuring of the foot easier, faster, and more thorough would increase the chances of customers finding the right set of boots. The measurements that need to be taken for a proper boot matching to be made were found to be foot length, foot width, instep height, and calf volume. Through a design process combining a convergent/divergent and an iterative phase a tool that can take these measurements was designed and developed. The tool is a sock with built in stretch sensors that align themselves on the user’s foot in the correct places as the user puts on the sock. With a microcontroller the sock takes the measurements and sends them wirelessly to a screen that is placed in the store making it easy for the user to read the measurements. On the screen the user can also see what boot they are recommended to rent based on the measurements and book them directly on the screen.

The ever-increasing growth of data demands reliable data-base system with high-throughput and low-latency. Main memory-based column store database systems are state-of-the-art on this perspective, whereby data (values) in relational tables are organized by columns rather than by rows. In such systems, a full column scan is a fundamental key operation and thus, the optimization of the key operation is very crucial. This leads to have compact storage layout based fast column scan techniques through intra-value parallelism. For this reason, we investigated on different well-known fast column scan techniques using SIMD (Single Instruction Multiple Data) vectorization as well as using Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA). Moreover, we present selective results of our exhaustive evaluation. Based on this evaluation, we find out the best column scan technique as per implementation mechanism–FPGA and SIMD. Finally, we conclude this paper via mentioning some lessons learned for our ongoing research activities.

Matsvinn är försummandet av mat som är producerat för att konsumeras. Matsvinn innebär inte bara en ekonomisk förlust, utan bidrar också till ökat koldioxidutsläpp. Matsvinn sker i alla sektorer av matkedjan, men till stor del i livsmedelsbutiker. Sedan flera år använder livsmedelsbutiker automatiserade ordersystem för att räkna ut hur mycket av vad som ska inhandlas till butiken. Sedan införandet av dessa system har prognostiseringen av vad som kommer att säljas förbättrats och matsvinnet har därmed minskat. Syftet med denna studie är att diskutera potential till ytterligare utvecklingsmöjligheter inom dessa automatiska ordersystem i arbetet för minskat matsvinn. En fallstudie utfördes och kvalitativ data insamlades dels genom semistrukturerade intervjuer med tre butikschefer och en hållbarhets- och kvalitetssamordnare inom en matvarukoncern, och dels genom information som finns öppen på internet kring befintliga ordersystem som används i dessa matvarukoncerner. Analysen av datan gav återkommande teman som användes för att, tillsammans med relaterad forskning om bland annat Bullwhipeffekten, Green Supply Chain Management, Sustainable frameworks och Grading systems analysera hur man kan förbättra butikernas system för att minska matsvinn. Ytterligare utvecklingsmöjligheter innefattar fler ingående variabler i de automatiserade systemen, men också vikten av kommunikation och samarbete mellan utvecklare av systemen och användarna i butiken, så att systemet används optimalt. / Food waste is the neglect of food that is produced for consumption. Food waste is not only an economic loss but also contributes to increased carbon dioxide emissions. Food waste occurs in all sectors of the food chain, but second most in grocery stores. For several years now, grocery stores have been using automated ordering systems to calculate how much of what is to be purchased for the store. Since the introduction of these systems, the forecasting of what will be sold has improved and food waste has thus decreased. The purpose of this study is to discuss the potential for further development opportunities within these automatic order systems in the work to reduce food waste. A case study was conducted and qualitative data was collected partly through semi-structured interviews with three store managers and a sustainability and quality coordinator within a food group, and partly through information available on the internet about existing systems used by store chains against food waste and the parameters used in these systems was used to, together with related research on the Bullwhip effect, Green Supply Chain Management, Sustainable Frameworks and Grading systems, analyze how to improve stores' systems to prevent food waste. The thesis explores how existing automated ordering systems for purchasing and forecasting sales can be improved to reduce food waste. Additional development opportunities include more in-depth variables in the automated systems, but also the importance of communication and collaboration between developers of the systems and users in the store, so that the system is used optimally.

Consumer culture of social classes in terms of food purchasing and consumption habits Monika Novotná Abstract This work deals with historical and sociological view on the issue of grocery obtaining and consumption between the end of World War II to the present. Grocery obtaining and consumption is understood as a symbolic expression of social status in society. The work is divided into two parts. Theoretical-historical part examines how food consumption is linked to changes of social stratification. Research part of thesis builds on the theme of food consumption by examining the shopping habits in relation to social class. The main question of theoretical-historical part is whether and how food consumption, relates to social differentiation. Trend of convergence of differences in consumption and rate of consumption stratification of social classes are monitored in time series in two eras - the communist period and the period after 1989. For both periods, a secondary analysis of historical data on the consumption of specific types of food that aims to detect differences or similar trends between social classes. While in the period of communism different social strata tend to convergence their consumption, with the exception of the cooperative farmers, whose consumption is influenced by self-supplying, after...

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The objective of this research is to examine the development of the California alcohol outlets over time and the relationship between neighborhood characteristics and densities of the alcohol outlets. Two types of advanced analyses were done after the usual preliminary description of data. Firstly, fixed and random effects linear regression were used for the county panel data across time (1945-2010) with a dummy variable added to capture the change in law regarding limitations on alcohol outlets density. Secondly, a Bayesian spatio-temporal Poisson regression of the census tract panel data was conducted to capture recent availability of population characteristics affecting outlet density. The spatial Conditional Autoregressive model was embedded in the Poisson regression to detect spatial dependency of unexplained variance of alcohol outlet density. The results show that the alcohol outlets density reduced under the limitation law over time. However, it was no more effective in reducing the growth of alcohol outlets after the limitation was modified to be more restrictive. Poorer, higher vacancy rate and lower percentage of Black neighborhoods tend to have higher alcohol outlet density (numbers of alcohol outlets to population ratio) for both on-sale general and off-sale general. Other characteristics like percentage of Hispanics, percentage of Asians, percentage of younger population and median income of adjacency neighbors were associated with densities of on-sale general and off sale general alcohol outlets. Some regions like the San Francisco Bay area and the Greater Los Angeles area have more alcohol outlets than the predictions of neighborhood characteristics included in the model.

Entrepreneurship is generally defined as the creation of new businesses - yet, nowhere is it more important than in large, established organisations. Product life cycles are contracting and businesses need to stay ahead of competition. Organisations need innovative and creative employees to respond to the changing needs of the market. Corporate entrepreneurship can be defined as entrepreneurial activities within an organisation, using the resources of the organisation to achieve innovative results. Corporate entrepreneurship (also referred to as intrapreneurship) is not confined to a particular size or stage of an organisation. This study focuses on the corporate entrepreneurial behaviour of middle managers inside a large retail organisation. The uniqueness of this study is the focus on the middle managers instead of senior management. The study aims to make management aware of the concept of corporate entrepreneurship and to identify the factors which influence entrepreneurial behaviour in an established organisation. / Business Management / M. Com (Business Management)