Title
The value of virtual pooling in dual sales channel supply chains
Abstract
Recently the most significant growth in online retailing has been attributed to traditional offline retailers extending their brands online. Unfortunately, there is little research addressing the value of better information in retail/e-tail organizations. To fill this gap, this paper examines how investing in the continuous monitoring of online demands and inventory positions can provide economic benefit for companies that handle both in-store and online sales. Specifically, we develop and evaluate two dynamic assignment policies that incorporate real time information to specify which of a firm’s e-fulfillment locations will handle each of its Internet sales. Computational results indicate that investing in dynamic assignment capability can reduce system cost (holding, backorder, and transportation) by as much as 8.2% over the optimal static policy. The percentage of sales occurring online plays a critical role in determining the magnitude of the benefit.
Year
DOI
Venue
2009
10.1016/j.ejor.2007.09.034
European Journal of Operational Research
Keywords
Field
DocType
Supply chain management,E-commerce,Dual sales channel
Real-time data,Pooling,Communication channel,Sales management,Supply chain management,Supply chain,Operations management,Mathematics,E-commerce,The Internet
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
192
2
0377-2217
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
13
0.65
10
Authors
3
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Stephen Mahar1565.27
Kurt M. Bretthauer230023.24
M. A. Venkataramanan324520.52