基于多个不同类型消费者的零售商产品组合和库存策略研究

We consider assortment planning with multiple customer segments in online and traditional retailing. In each retailing model, we consider two settings: single supplier with multiple products and multiple suppliers. In online retailing, customers arrive sequentially and make their choices according to a choice process. Online retailers know each arriving customer's type and decide which subset of products to offer. We plan to derive the optimal assortment and inventory decision and characterize the structure of the dynamic assortment for each customer type. We also study how the customer segmentation affects the assortment policy and develop near-optimal heuristics for online retailers with hundreds of products. In traditional retailing, products are distributed by a distribution system which has been widely used in traditional retailers. The distribution system consists of one distribution center and multiple stores. Each store covers a part of the entire market with distinctive characteristics of customers. We analyze the optimal assortment and inventory policy in the distribution center and the stores. In particular, we are interested in studying the assortment coordination scheme among the distribution center and the stores, because distictive customer segmentations in the stores lead to different assortment policies. After analyzing these two main retailing models, we consider the competition between the online and traditional retailing, studying how the online retailer makes the assortment and inventory policy in response to its rival's operational decisions and vice versa.

本项目考虑了面对不同类型消费者的零售商产品组合和库存管理策略。我们考虑了两个主要的零售模式: 电子商务和传统零售模式。本项目拟在不同的零售模式下分别研究单个供应商中产品种类竞争模式和多个供应商相互竞争模式。在电子商务零售模式下，零售商可以针对不同消费者类型动态的展示产品种类。消费者根据选择模型在所提供的产品种类中进行选择。我们深入分析了电子商务零售商的产品组合的结构以及面对不同类型消费者的动态产品展示策略。在传统零售模式下，我们考虑经典的分销式销售系统。该系统包含一个分销中心和多个分店。各个分店覆盖的市场具有不同消费者特性。我们研究分销中心的产品组合和库存管理策略，以及各个分店针对各自独特消费者群体而制定的产品组合和库存管理策略。最后，我们研究电子商务和传统零售商相互竞争模式下,各个零售商如何根据对手的运作策略来调整自己的产品组合和库存管理策略以及产品种类在不同零售模式下的分布情况.

本研究的主要成果包含：随着中国经济和信息技术的快速发展，中产阶级大规模涌现，推动了零售企业的发展，消费者的选择行为和理念也因此发生了巨大的变化。作为本研究的基础，我们首先对现有文献中的消费者选择模型进行了总结分析，进一步发展和构建了符合新时代特点的消费者选择模型。首先，在多产品竞争的情况下，我们考虑了两种不同的离散产品选择模型：混合型Multinomial Logit Model (MNL) 消费者选择模型和基于性价比的消费者选择模型。其中基于性价比的消费者选择模型得到了真实的中国电视市场销售数据强有力的支撑。该模型可以很好地刻画中国消费者在选择电视产品时的选择行为。我们还考虑了文献中很少研究的顾客重复购买行为。另外，我们还对“团购”这种全新商业模式下的消费者行为展开了研究。在这些消费者选择模型的基础上，我们针对不同的消费者选择行为，分别研究了库存分配策略，最优定价策略以及博弈均衡等问题。我们已在国外学术刊物发表论文三篇，其中：运营管理国际顶级杂志一篇、运营管理国际著名杂志两篇。另有一些论文即将投稿。参加多次国内和国际会议。