Didier Chabaud

How to integrate the specificities of some food departments into a retail store organization

Purpose – To understand the impact of product specificity on organizational practices of retailers at the store level.Design/methodology/approach – An Aokian framework is used that enables one to discriminate between food products according to their informational properties, and to connect these properties with organizational choices of centralization/decentralization.Findings – Emphasizes the existing tension between the dominant “assimilation” organization pattern and the “encapsulation” pattern which fits better in with some specific product departments.Research limitations/implications – Proposals are confronted with empirical data coming from professional press and experts interviews. Further empirical research is needed to consolidate the findings.Practical implications – The paper points out the need to differentiate the management of departments according to their product specificity.Originality/value – The paper stresses the impact of product specificity on department organization. It can be usef...

Private Labels in the Service of Purchasing Power: A New Deal?

We study the traditional described price gap between national brands and private labels. First, we present several observations relating to the evolution of this price gap on recent years, and emphasize the role played by the competitive game and the French institutional game in the dynamic of this gap. Moreover, we discuss the accuracy of global measures of this gap in order to analyze the retailing dynamics.

Private Labels and Purchasing Power: A Positioning Review?

A 20% price gap between national brands and private labels is generally asserted in literature. We show that the evolution of this price gap, in recent years, questioned this assertion. We explain this by a combination of competition and the evolution of French institutional rules. Nevertheless, taking into account the private labels strategy leads us to question the accuracy of global measures of this gap in order to analyze retailing dynamics.