Retail logistics versus retail marketing: past, present and future
David B. Grant
- When?
- Friday 3 February 2012, 11:00 to 12:00
- Where?
- 66MS03
- Open to:
- Public, Staff, Students
- Speaker:
- Professor David B. Grant
- Admission information:
- Please RSVP to FBEL Events at: fbelevents@surrey.ac.uk
Surrey Business School's Marketing and Retail Group are proud to present a seminar delivered by Professor Grant, University of Hull
Abstract
This seminar will reflect upon a decade’s research of logistics customer service in the retail industry to present a current appreciation of the strategic connections and disconnections between retail logistics and retail marketing or merchandising. Retail logistics in the UK is considered by many to lead the world, especially in the grocery sector, and there is much reliable evidence for this claim. However, such claims do not credit the need to develop world-class supply chains as an isolated and oligopolistic island environment. Further, there continues to be in-store issues regarding retail operations such as sourcing, inventory management, replenishment and availability, human resources and online provision that concomitantly affect customer service, satisfaction and profitability. Current examples of these issues evidenced by research will be reviewed before observations are provided about what retailers should do in future versus what they will likely do. The seminar will conclude with some brief alternative and unpopular points of view to the somewhat fractious relationship between consumers, retailers and logisticians, including reducing product ranges, increasing road infrastructure to ease traffic congestion, charging the full cost of products and services for both in-store and home delivery provision, and educating consumers regarding wastage incurred from over-consumption.
Biography
Professor David B. Grant is Professor of Logistics and Director of the Logistics Institute. Previous appointments at Heriot-Watt University and the Universities of Edinburgh, Calgary and Lethbridge.
Business experience includes retail, corporate banking, technical design, and financial and marketing consulting and seminar facilitation for clients in Canada and the United States. Recent applied research has investigated on-shelf availability and out-of-stocks, total loss and waste in food retailing, forecasting and obsolete inventory, service quality of internet retailers, and consumer logistics and shopping convenience in both grocery and non-grocery contexts.
