Joint inventory and transshipment decisions with consumer behavioral heterogeneity  

作　　者：Pingping Feng Jian Chai Zhongquan Hu Wei Zong Feng Wu Devin J.Wang 

机构地区：[1]School of Economics and Management,Xidian University,Xi'an,710126,China b School of Management,Xi'an Jiaotong University,Xi'an,710049,China [2]Department of Managament Scinece and Information Systems,Rutgers University,Piscataway,NJ,08854,USA

出　　处：《Journal of Management Science and Engineering》2023年第3期369-385,共17页管理科学学报（英文版）

基　　金：supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China(71901170,72102174,71874133,72001164,171871177);Natural Science Basic Research Program of Shaanxi(2021JM-144);Ministry of Educationof Humanities and Social Science Project(21XJC630004);Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities(RW210103JBF220602).

摘　　要：Transshipment is an effective method for reducing mismatches between supply and demand among retailers.Consumers attempting to purchase out-of-stock items may wait for transshipment,purchase at another store,or choose not to buy.In this paper,the consumer behavioral heterogeneity is characterized using the transshipment request rate and consumer switching rate.It affects the replenishment and transshipment decisions,as well as the system profits.The inventory replenishment and transshipment decisions are studied in both centralized and decentralized two-location inventory systems with consumer behavioral heterogeneity.We characterize optimal replenishment decisions in a centralized system,prove the existence of a unique Nash equilibrium in a decentralized system with a specific demand distribution,and determine the coordinating transshipment price for some decentralized systems.In numerical studies,the performance of various systems is analyzed for consumers with identical(symmetric)or differing(asymmetric)behavior between retailers.For scenarios with symmetric consumers,a higher transshipment request rate and consumer switching rate resulted in increased total profit in all systems.For scenarios with asymmetric consumers,the retailer with the higher consumer switching rate should reduce ordering in a centralized system but increase ordering in a decentralized system.Moreover,the retailer with the higher transshipment request rate reduces ordering to increase profit,whereas the other retailer increases order quantity yet earns less profit.

关 键 词：Inventory management Lateral transshipment Nash equilibrium Consumer behavior 

分 类 号：G229.2[文化科学] F713.55[经济管理—市场营销]