Supply chain coordination with customer returns and retailer's store brand product

Abstract

We examine a retailer's Stackelberg supply chain, in which the retailer sells a product in the two brands: its own store brand (SB) and a national brand (NB) supplied by a well-established manufacturer. The two brands both face customer returns, and they differ in product quality. We examine the retailer's decision on returns policies for the two brands (either Money Back Guarantee (MBG) or No Refund) and the effects of returns policies on the competition between the two brands. We identify the condition when the retailer should offer MBGs for both brands and we show that MBGs mitigate price competition between the two brands. MBGs are found to enhance the retailer's profit and reduce the NB manufacturer's profit. We examine coordination mechanisms and find that a centralized supply chain intensifies the competition and pushes the NB to reduce its retail price. A simple coordination contract that can achieve supply chain coordination to ensure a win-win for both the retailer and the NB manufacturer is proposed.