Stefan Elsner
University of Trier
Network
Latest external collaboration on country level. Dive into details by clicking on the dots.
Publication
Featured researches published by Stefan Elsner.
Marketing ZFP | 2009
Bernhard Swoboda; Joachim Zentes; Stefan Elsner
Prof. Dr. Prof. h.c. Bernhard Swoboda is Professor of Marketing and Retailing at Trier University, Universitaetsring 15, 54286 Trier, Germany, Phone: +49 (0) 651 201–3050, Fax: +49 (0)651 201–4165, EMail: [email protected]. Prof. Dr. Joachim Zentes is Professor and Director of the Institute for Commerce and International Marketing at Saarland University, Campus Building A5.4, 66123 Saarbruecken, Germany, Phone: +49 (0)681 302–4475, Fax: +49 (0)681 302–4532, E-Mail: [email protected]. Dipl.-Kfm. Stefan Elsner is Ph.D. Student of Marketing and Retailing at Trier University, Universitaetsring 15, 54286 Trier, Germany, Phone: +49 (0)651 201–2630, Fax: +49 (0)651 201–4165, E-Mail: [email protected]. Internationalisation of Retail Firms: State of the Art after 20 Years of Research
Journal of International Marketing | 2013
Bernhard Swoboda; Stefan Elsner
Research shows that most retailers expand abroad by transferring some elements of their format, and therefore their value chain, unchanged, while adapting other elements. However, little is known about how strongly a retail formats standardized or adapted elements affect performance in a foreign country. To shed light on this issue, this study focuses on the design of important processes and offerings, as both determine retailers’ efficiency and sales. This study proposes that successful retailers build on the unchanged know-how parts of the format by combining more standardized core elements with adapted peripheral elements. The authors draw from a survey of 102 international retailers and interviews with 126 executives conducted at their headquarters. The results show that retailers transfer offers (marketing programs) and processes (marketing and supply chain) differently and hierarchically; that is, peripheral elements are allowed to vary, whereas core elements are transferred in a more standardized manner. Furthermore, the relationship between marketing program elements and performance varies: the use of standardized core elements (e.g., store types, locations) and adapted peripheral elements (e.g., assortments, promotions) is advisable for increasing performance in another country. Processes are only indirectly associated with performance. These observations hold true for both psychically close and distant countries.
Archive | 2012
Bernhard Swoboda; Stefan Elsner
Seit den neunziger Jahren, und somit lange nach den herstellenden Unternehmen, internationalisieren Handelsunternehmen dynamisch. Fuhrende Unternehmen wie Zara, The Body Shop, Carrefour, Metro und IKEA sind in bis zu 70 Landern prasent und realisieren Auslandsumsatzanteile von bis zu 80 Prozent. Im Zuge dessen mussen international expandierende Handelsunternehmen Entscheidungen uber den zu betretenen Markt, die zu wahlende Markteintrittsstrategie und die Art der Marktbearbeitung treffen. Dieser Beitrag fokussiert die Wahl der Markteintrittsstrategie, begriffen als institutionelle Arrangements, die den Erfolg sowie die Kontrolle uber Auslandsaktivitaten bestimmen (Brouthers et al. 2003; Brouthers et al. 2008). Die Wahl der Eintrittsstrategie erscheint im Handel besonders relevant, da jeder Markteintritt relativ kapitalintensiv ist, bedingt durch die Notwendigkeit des Aufbaus lokaler Filialnetzwerke und direkter Kundenkontakte. Daher kann eine intensive Bewertung externer und interner Umfeldfaktoren als Basis fur die Wahl der geeignetsten Eintrittsstrategie fur einen Landermarkt erwartet werden. Indessen zeigen Forschung und Praxis anderes.
Archive | 2011
Bernhard Swoboda; Stefan Elsner
Dieser Beitrag untersucht auf Basis des Integration-Responsiveness-(IR-)Frameworks die Praferenzen von Handelsunternehmen fur Internationalisierungsstrategien sowie Erfolgs-/ Produktivitatsunterschiede einzelner Internationalisierungsstrategien. Daruber hinaus wird zwischen Food-/Near-Food- und Non-Food-Handelsunternehmen kontrastiert.
Archive | 2014
Stefan Elsner
When going abroad, retailers are forced to manage their external marketing program and internal organizational structure, which generally involves the most important and challenging decisions a firm has to face in the international marketing arena (e.g., Cavusgil and Zou 1994; Ozsomer and Prussia 2000). Regarding the long-lasting debate about marketing program standardization (Schmid and Kotulla 2011), which is defined as employing the same marketing-mix characteristics across several countries (Schilke, Reimann and Thomas 2009), retailers have to find the right balance between standardization and adaptation of their retail marketing program across countries in order to be successful.
Archive | 2014
Stefan Elsner
The choice of a foreign market entry mode, i.e., an institutional arrangement that makes possible the entry of firm resources into a foreign country (Root 1987), is known as a crucial decision because this choice drives performance (Brouthers 2002; Brouthers, Brouthers and Werner 2003) and is difficult to change once established (Pedersen, Petersen and Benito 2002; Swoboda, Olejnik and Morschett 2011).
Archive | 2014
Stefan Elsner
Retailers have been aggressively internationalizing for two decades, first into psychically close countries and then into distant countries, primarily based on format elements familiar in the home markets. Goldman (2001) has already demonstrated that few retailers transfer formats and thus combinations of visible marketing offers and retail know-how (i.e., processes and firm culture according to Hollander 1970; Kacker 1988) unchanged, whereas most retailers adapt various format elements. Recent studies confirm this finding.
Archive | 2014
Bernhard Swoboda; Stefan Elsner
Retail store flyers are an important medium for influencing customers’ perceptions of store image, and ultimately their purchasing behaviour. This study investigates to what degree the depiction on store flyers of store owners and their employees, physically attractive models, or no one at all, affects these attributes. The researchers interviewed 300 respondents and distributed 90,000 store flyers, and found that corporate credibility is important when using store flyers in advertising. Corporate credibility has a greater effect on advertising evaluations when the depictions are of store owners and their employees, rather than of physically attractive models, or when they contain no endorsements at all. This conclusion is especially important for retailers who are owner-managers, because such an approach enables them to set themselves apart from larger retail chains that are unable to use their company managers because anonymous figures usually occupy their management positions. However, the findings do not support the same influence on purchasing behaviour.
Archive | 2012
Bernhard Swoboda; Stefan Elsner
This study addresses standardization vs. adaptation decisions in the context of international store retailers. Enhancing present research, the relationship between visible marketing offers and internal processes is analyzed. Based on interviews with top managers, the data show that the degree of standardization of retail marketing instruments influences the degree of standardization of marketing and supply chain processes. But there are differences in psychically dis- tant and psychically close markets. The results show that strategic and operative marketing instruments are standardized rather differently and have different impacts on standardization of processes. This underlines a more distinctive and complex view of standardization vs. adaptation decisions in international retailing research. For managers, the results emphasize the re- levance of market offer arrangements to changes in processes and vice versa.
Long Range Planning | 2014
Bernhard Swoboda; Stefan Elsner; Dirk Morschett