Can e-commerce platforms build the resilience of brick-and-mortar businesses to the COVID-19 shock? An empirical analysis in the Chinese retail industry

Abstract

We proposed a research model that examined the differences between the contributions of large, third-party e-commerce platforms and self-operated e-commerce platforms to businesses’ resilience to the COVID-19 shock. The difference-in-differences approach was employed to analyze a substantial sample of Chinese retailers. The study found that (1) under the baseline condition, the large, third-party e-commerce platforms built significant resilience for the brick-and-mortar businesses, (2) resource constraints induced by factor immobility weakened the contribution of large, third-party e-commerce platforms to the businesses’ resilience in regions of severe shock, and (3) the physical retailers’ self-operated EC platforms built resilience in regions of severe shock.