Seeking survivals under COVID-19: The WhatsApp platform's shopping service operations.

ABSTRACT: Under COVID-19 outbreak, retail operations are seriously threatened. There are lots of cases in which physical stores basically have to stop operating. This creates problems to the firm, its employees, and consumers. Recently, Timberland in Hong Kong and various other brands such as Joyce Boutiques and The North Face have established the "WhatsApp Shopping Service Operation" (WSO) in which consumers can shop by using the well-established communication tool "WhatsApp." Salespeople in stores provide services via WhatsApp to assist the consumers without them having to visit the stores. We collect primary data from real-world cases and theoretically explore WSO. We build a standard consumer utility based model to derive the firm's optimal pricing and employment decisions under different

SUBMITTER: Xu X 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9011542 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature