主管:中国科学院
主办:中国优选法统筹法与经济数学研究会
   中国科学院科技战略咨询研究院

Chinese Journal of Management Science ›› 2020, Vol. 28 ›› Issue (7): 132-145.doi: 10.16381/j.cnki.issn1003-207x.2020.07.013

• Articles • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Two-period Pricing and Contract Design of Supply Chain Considering Consumers' Strategic Behavior

ZHANG Xu-mei1,2, WANG Da-fei1,2, REN Ting-hai1,2, GUAN Zi-li1,2, DAN Bin1,2   

  1. 1. School of Economics and Business Administration, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400044, China;
    2. Chongqing Key Laboratory of Logistics, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400044, China
  • Received:2018-03-01 Revised:2018-08-10 Online:2020-07-20 Published:2020-08-04

Abstract: With the rapid development of information technology and internet, it is more and more convenient for consumers to obtain product information. As a result, consumers are becoming more and more rational. Consumers can strategically choose the time for purchase to maximize their utility. Because of the perishability of products and the fierce market competition, the firms often use markdown promotion to increase sales. Although the sales revenue can be quickly realized by markdown promotion, it will induce more consumers to choose to purchase at the markdown sales stage. This may lead to a reduction in demand at the normal sales stage, which is not benefit for the firms to obtain the high profit. In addition, the reduction in demand during the normal sales stage will lead to a reduction in the order quantity, which will adversely affect the upstream manufacturers. Therefore, according to the strategic purchase behavior of consumers, how to set the price in the normal sales and promotion stage and how to design effective contracts to coordinate the supply chain are researched in this paper.
Considering a supply chain consists of a manufacturer and a retailer in which consumers' strategic purchase behavior exists, a two-period dynamic game model is established to analyze the effects of strategic degree of consumers' purchase behavior on the two-period equilibrium results, consumer surplus and social welfare. The optimal two-period dynamic pricing of the manufacturer and the retailer is studied. Further, the equilibrium results under the decentralized decision are compared with those under the centralized decision. Moreover, a two-period revenue sharing contract and a two-period revenue sharing contract combined with a transfer payment are proposed, which are related to the consumers' strategic degree.
The results show that:(1) When the consumers' strategic degree is high, both the manufacturer and the retailer should decrease the price of the first period and increase the price of the second period, the total profit of the manufacturer and the retailer for two periods will decrease, the consumer surplus and social welfare will increase. (2) Under some cases, the consumers' strategic degree will weaken the price distortion in the two periods of decentralized decision, but the differences between the decentralized and the centralized system profits will increase with the consumers' strategic degree. (3) When the consumers' strategic degree is below a certain threshold, the two-period revenue-sharing contract can not only achieve supply chain perfect coordination but also improve consumer surplus and social welfare. (4) When the consumers' strategic degree is not below a certain threshold, the two-period revenue sharing combined with a transfer payment contract can achieve supply chain perfect coordination. However, the increase of consumers' strategic degree is not always able to improve consumer surplus or social welfare in this case.

Key words: consumers' strategic behavior, dynamic pricing, supply chain coordination, two-period revenue sharing contract

CLC Number: