Private labels, also known as store brands, are an important component of competitive strategy among multi-product retailers, as they can increase retailers’ power over suppliers in the vertical channel or facilitate horizontal differentiation among retailers. This paper seeks to identify...

We devise a formal test of market power that is applied to the international durum market. The model captures the asymmetric cost structure brought about the initial payment system of the Canadian Wheat Board. The model generates testable hypotheses about market conduct and optimal strategic...

Slotting fees are fixed charges paid by food manufacturers to retailers for access to the retail market. The role of the practice and its effects on market efficiency are highly controversial. To date, the literature has focused on the effect of the practice on retail prices; however, slotting...

The demand for organic fresh fruits and vegetable continues to grow at a rate far higher than the rest of the produce industry. The cost of meeting organic certification standards, however, has meant that supply has been slow to adjust. With limited supply, we hypothesize that organic suppliers...

Prices for nearly all basic commodity rose at unprecedented rates throughout early 2008, only to fall nearly as fast as financial markets and global economies began to collapse. Rising food prices in 2008 led to concerns that commodity price spikes would lead to more general food inflation, but...

We investigate the strategic pricing for leading brands sold in the carbonated soft drink (CSD) market in the context of a flexible demand specification (i.e. random parameter nested logit) and a structural pricing equation. Our approach does not rely upon the often used ad hoc linear...

Concerns regarding the safety and integrity of the fresh produce supply chain are becoming all too common in the media. In 2006, an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 from farms in Central California sickened almost two hundred people and lead to the deaths of three. Estimated costs to the industry...