On fit uncertainty-reducing interventions in retail supply chains
Doctoral thesis, 2021

Fit uncertainty is used in this doctoral thesis to describe the customer’s experience of uncertainty about the physical fit of a product when shopping for experience goods. Experience goods are products whose attributes are difficult to ascertain without physical examination. In online retailing, the ability to provide experiential fit information is limited, which poses product flow and inventory challenges for supply chains, including product returns, lost sales, and obsolescence. Thus, product fitting is a critical pre-sales activity for customers to successfully purchase fit-dependent products, and retailers must facilitate the fitting activity in order to reduce unnecessary product handling. To foster improved performance for retail supply chains of experience goods subject to fit uncertainty, this doctoral thesis sets out to explore the effects of fit uncertainty and fit uncertainty-reducing interventions on retail supply chain performance.

Fit uncertainty-reducing interventions consist of existing digital product fitting and recommendation technologies. The research designs are included in the five appended research papers. Paper I uses a case survey of retail practices to develop a maturity model of digitalization of product fitting, and it proposes supply chain effects for each of the three maturity levels. Paper II uses three cases, design science, and interventionist research to conceptualize digital product fitting as an intervention that improves product flow and reduces lost sales in retail supply chains for experience goods. Paper III uses case research, quantitative analysis of return transactions, test of an intervention, and mathematical modeling to calculate product return costs associated with fit uncertainty in online retailing. Paper IV uses order and return transactions to investigate how online customers shopping for experience goods seek to mitigate fit uncertainty through different order-placing behaviors, and it assesses the cost implications of the behaviors. Paper V uses order and return transactions to explore the effects of an online apparel-fitting intervention on order performance outcomes and fit uncertainty-mitigating ordering tactics.

This thesis theorizes fit uncertainty-reducing interventions. The use of these interventions to facilitate the product-fitting activity can reduce fit uncertainty, leading to many benefits for the retail supply chain in terms of product flow, such as fewer returns and more sales. This thesis contributes to previous research on end-customer behaviors by focusing on order and return behaviors associated with fit uncertainty. The quantification of existent order and return behaviors is an important theoretical contribution to our understanding of the direct effects of fit uncertainty on retail supply chain performance. This thesis theoretically contributes to returns management and to inventory and assortment planning management; its practical contribution supports retail supply chains of experience goods that are reconsidering how they handle fit uncertainty and the unwanted effects thereof. This thesis provides hands-on knowledge on how the interventions work in real life and how they improve retail supply chain performance. Studying the link between fit uncertainty and retail supply chain performance is important for retailers and manufacturers' understanding of end-customer behavior and for improving product development and assortment planning to ensure availability of products that fit.

digital product fitting

retail supply chains

experience goods

product recommendation system

product recommender

Fit uncertainty

Vasa B, Vera Sandbergs Allé 8
Opponent: Professor Johan Hagberg, University of Gothenburg, Sweden

Author

Emmelie Gustafsson

Chalmers, Technology Management and Economics, Supply and Operations Management

Digital Product Fitting in Retail Supply Chains: Maturity Levels and Potential Outcomes

Supply Chain Management,;Vol. 24(2019)p. 574-589

Journal article

Reducing retail supply chain costs of product returns using digital product fitting

International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management,;Vol. 51(2021)p. 877-896

Journal article

The provision of experience goods online poses managerial challenges for retail supply chains, which need to cope with unnecessary product handling, excess inventory, and additional costs due to fit uncertainty. Experience goods are products whose attributes are difficult to ascertain without physical examination. Fit uncertainty denotes the customer’s experience of uncertainty about the physical fit of the product when shopping for experience goods.

Efficiently providing fitting products to customers is a costly process requiring inventory management and customer service. Retail supply chains face trade-offs between cost efficiency and responsiveness in terms of customers' willingness to wait for a product (a delivery lead time constraint), retailers' ability to stock variety (an inventory-holding constraint), and manufacturers' ability to responsively supply variety (a production-capacity constraint). Inefficiency in reaching customers results in waste and obsolescence, as indicated by retailers' markdowns or even disposal of products.

This thesis provides hands-on knowledge on how to digitalize product fitting in order to improve retail supply chain performance. Studying the link between fit uncertainty and retail supply chain performance is important for retailers and manufacturers' understanding of end-customer behavior and for improving product development and assortment planning to ensure availability of products that fit.

Digital model-driven physical retail and supply chain management (DM-Retail)

The Swedish Retail and Wholesale Council (2016:721), 2016-09-01 -- 2018-08-31.

Platform-based digital shoe retail (DigitalRetail)

The Swedish Retail and Wholesale Council (2018:847), 2018-11-27 -- 2020-11-27.

VINNOVA (2018-03619), 2018-11-27 -- 2020-11-27.

Areas of Advance

Information and Communication Technology

Transport

Production

Driving Forces

Sustainable development

Innovation and entrepreneurship

Subject Categories

Transport Systems and Logistics

ISBN

978-91-7905-548-6

Doktorsavhandlingar vid Chalmers tekniska högskola. Ny serie: 5015

Publisher

Chalmers

Vasa B, Vera Sandbergs Allé 8

Online

Opponent: Professor Johan Hagberg, University of Gothenburg, Sweden

More information

Latest update

3/22/2022