Co-creating consumer logistics from self-collection to crowd-sourced delivery: An examination on contextual differences in last-mile

Abstract

This study examines consumers’ willingness to co-create last-mile logistics, focusing on (1) the motivational effects of empowerment and shared responsibility perceptions and (2) the moderating effects of private-social and paid-unpaid contexts. A sociological view of consumer labour is integrated into the value co-creation literature to develop a conceptual framework. A survey is used for data collection utilising a scenario-based within-subject design. We found that consumers are motivated by the seemingly paradoxical needs for both empowerment and shared responsibility when collaborating with logistics operators, with the individualising motive as the mediator. Furthermore, consumers’ co-creation patterns are context dependent. While the empowerment perception is the dominant motivator in private logistics contexts (e.g., self-collection), its salience is suppressed in social settings (e.g., crowd-sourced delivery), giving rise to the shared responsibility perception as the more influential motivator. Our analysis also revealed that the private-social contextual moderating effect is hinged upon the presence of monetary rewards.