How Can Price Promotions Make Consumers More Interested? An Empirical Study from a Chinese Supermarket
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe article is very interesting, and I have read it with pleasure. It is concentrated around the conclusion, based on literature study, that the Chinese culture differs in such a way from Western cultures that price promotion used in supermarkets will have different effects on Chinese customer behaviour than on customers in the west.
Specific comments
Line 208. In hypothesis 1, the authors use the construct ‘supermarket performance’. Where can I find this construct (or variable) in the theoretical framework of figure 1?
In section 2. ‘Theoretical Framework and Hypotheses’ the authors elaborate a theoretical framework for research, and underpin two hypothesis. Where can I put these two hypothesis, H1 and H2, in the theoretical framework? It would also be better to put figure 1 ‘theoretical framework for research’ at the end of the section 2.
Line 253. Interaction term = cross-term?
Where do I read in the article explicitly if hypothesis 1 and hypothesis 2 is rejected or accepted, and why?
Line 676 and further. It would be a good idea to make a distinction in what is now the conclusion section, where you also elaborate a specific section for management implications, limitations of the research, and future research.
Author Response
Dear reviewer，
Thank you very much for your careful review of our paper. Your valuable comments have provided us with great help to further improve our paper. We have read through comments carefully and have made corrections. Based on the instructions provided in your letter, we uploaded the file of the revised manuscript. The responses to your comments are presented following.
Q1: Maybe to note values in EUR or / $ currency along with yuan currency
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. In the original manuscript we did not take into account the universality of monetary units. In the new revised text, we note the conversion of China's currency to the US dollar and the euro. The details are in the footnotes to Table 2., "Yuan" is the common currency unit in China.1 yuan is equal to about 0.139 US dollars and 1 yuan is equal to about 0.127 euros. In future writing, we will pay more attention to the unity and universality of units.
Q2: When you use GMM term for the first time in the text note it full meaning
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. According with the suggestions, we have made a supplementary explanation of the GMM method. This method is briefly described in the new manuscript when GMM first appears in 3.1, which will make it easier for readers to understand our data processing method. The supplementary content is as follows: GMM is a statistical method used to estimate panel data models, which introduces lagged variables by differencing panel data, so that the model includes dynamic characteristics and thus better reflects the relationship between variables. And this method can be taken as a further robust result for better use of different IVs to solve the endogenous problem in the model.
Q3: Why you have used panel data analysis
Response: We are very grateful for the question. In this study, the data we use are sales data from 10 supermarket stores during 26 promotion seasons. The sales data of these 10 stores in the 26 promotion seasons constitute a set of 10*26 panel data, so the panel data model is mainly used in the data analysis of this study. The description of data structure is supplemented in line 302-304 of the revised manuscript. We will be more careful about the data structure in the future.
Q4: 3.1 Econometric Method chapter needs to be shortened.
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. In combination with the suggestions and relevant literature, after retaining the model and variable descriptions corresponding to the empirical regression as well as important calculation formulas, we have deleted some redundant expressions and reduced Section 3.1 as much as possible. We will also pay more attention to concise expression in future writing.
Q5: It would be useful to show the profile of the supermarkets used in the analysis (turnover; number of employees; …); did you include different supermarkets selling places or you for example used XYZ supermarket available on different locations?
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion and highly recognize your suggestions. We think it will be very helpful to further discuss our research content if we analyze the operation data of supermarket stores. However, it is a great pity that we learned from the communication process with the supermarket that their business data and store information cannot be disclosed to us with authorization. Therefore, we cannot analyze the general situation and operation characteristics of supermarkets in the study, which is also the limitation of this study. In order to make up for this deficiency, the population and consumption characteristics of supermarkets are reflected in the equation setting by increasing the population and per capita disposable income of the areas where 10 stores are located. In this study, 10 stores are located in different areas of the same city, so location-related control variables are set among the control variables of the model.
Q6: Is there any limitation of this research? If any, please note.
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. In this study, we have two main limitations. The first aspect, as you mentioned above, mainly lies in the lack of information in supermarkets. Due to the privacy of supermarket operation, we cannot obtain more specific operation characteristic data related to each store in supermarkets, so we cannot control some operation index variables in the analysis, which may lead to some errors in our results. Another shortcoming is the lack of information relevant to consumers. We cannot obtain consumer characteristics corresponding to sales records, so the analysis of different consumer purchasing behaviors is not specific enough. In this study, it can only be inferred theoretically that price promotion promotes the purchase behavior of time-sensitive and price-sensitive consumers, but it cannot be tested through empirical analysis. Future research can be extended and expanded in these two aspects. The problem of insufficient information of enterprises can be solved by the research method of case analysis, and consumer research can be carried out for the study of consumer characteristics. The above content is mainly written in part 6 in the new revised manuscript.
We would love to thank you for allowing us to resubmit a revised copy of the manuscript and we highly appreciate your time and consideration.
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsRecommendations
More precise title for “Table 2. Data Description of Variables” has to be formulated as there are included main statistical indicators of descriptive statistics.
More explanation is needed – how to understand for sample size
“Quantity of products in category (pieces)” min 10.75 and max 780.80?
“Per capita disposable income (ten thousand yuan)” – sample size 10
And “Population (ten thousand people)” – sample size 10, etc.
Maybe in “sample size” column name has to be formulated with more precise title.
Why R-squares with regression equations are not used?
Do not use double numbers in reference list – the same numbers repeat twice;
Use the same style for references in reference list: for some authors there are used first name and family name, in other – there are used family names and first letter/letters of the first name/names.
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageUse more precise terminology, especially for sample size and for table 2 title..
Recommendations
More precise title for “Table 2. Data Description of Variables” has to be formulated as there are included main statistical indicators of descriptive statistics.
More explanation is needed – how to understand for sample size
“Quantity of products in category (pieces)” min 10.75 and max 780.80?
“Per capita disposable income (ten thousand yuan)” – sample size 10
And “Population (ten thousand people)” – sample size 10, etc.
Maybe in “sample size” column name has to be formulated with more precise title.
Why R-squares with regression equations are not used?
Do not use double numbers in reference list – the same numbers repeat twice;
Use the same style for references in reference list: for some authors there are used first name and family name, in other – there are used family names and first letter/letters of the first name/names.
Author Response
Dear reviewer，
Thank you very much for your careful review of our paper. Your valuable comments have provided us with great help to further improve our paper. We have read through comments carefully and have made corrections. Based on the instructions provided in your letter, we uploaded the file of the revised manuscript. The responses to your comments are presented following.
Q1: More precise title for “Table 2. Data Description of Variables” has to be formulated as there are included main statistical indicators of descriptive statistics.
Response: We are grateful for the suggestion. The headings in our original manuscript are too general to accurately express the table content. According with the suggestions, we have redrafted the title of the table according to the content of Table 2. The new title is: "Summary statistics of supermarket promotion methods and product category characteristics"(line 391-392). And we will pay more attention to the accuracy of expression in academic writing.
Q2: More explanation is needed – how to understand for sample size
“Quantity of products in category (pieces)” min 10.75 and max 780.80?
“Per capita disposable income (ten thousand yuan)” – sample size 10
And “Population (ten thousand people)” – sample size 10, etc.
Response: We are grateful for the question. According with the suggestion, we have reconsidered this expression in the manuscript. We think that the definition of sample size in the original paper is very inappropriate. The title of this column of data is more about the number of statistics of each variable. In the modified version, we changed this name to the number of variable values.
And in “Quantity of products in category (pieces)” row, we conducted statistical analysis on the product quantity of 30 categories in 10 stores, as shown in Table 3 below. Among them, the number of products in the small office appliance category is at least 10.75, while the number of products in the Head care category is at most 780.80. This may be related to the product characteristics of each category as well as the product operation objectives of the store. In the process of writing the paper, we will pay more attention to the data processing with a large gap.
In “Per capita disposable income (ten thousand yuan)” and “Population (ten thousand people)”sample size column,we have realized that there are errors in the expression of sample size. What we want to express is that this variable has a total of 10 variable values. Therefore, in the modified version, we have changed the sample size to the number of variable values. Furthermore, the 10 variable values of these two variables are because we choose the per capita disposable number and the population in the area where the 10 stores are located as the control variables for the characteristics of each store. In order to avoid misunderstanding, we add supplementary introduction in the data description section of 3.3 in the revised manuscript (line383-386) . In future writing, we will also be more cautious about the processing and description of data.
Q3: Maybe in “sample size” column name has to be formulated with more precise title.
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. We have realized that there are errors in the expression of sample size. According with the suggestion, we have reconsidered this expression in the manuscript. This column of data we actually want to express the number of variable values that each variable contains. Therefore, we change the name of this column to the number of variable values. And we will also pay more attention to the precision of expression in the future.
Q4: Why R-squares with regression equations are not used?
Response: We are very grateful for the question. In the original manuscript, we neglected to report the R-squares in the regression results, which has a great impact on the completeness of the regression results. According with the suggestion, we have revised the table (table 4 to table 7) of regression results in the revised manuscript, and added the R-square data report. We will be more serious and rigorous in the report of data results in the future.
Q5: Do not use double numbers in reference list – the same numbers repeat twice;
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. According with the suggestions, we have re-examined the reference list carefully. The problem of serial number duplication in the revision process has been modified. In the new version of the manuscript, each serial number appears only once. We will pay more attention to similar issues in the future revision of the article.
Q6: Use the same style for references in reference list: for some authors there are used first name and family name, in other – there are used family names and first letter/letters of the first name/names.
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. Based on the suggestions you provided, we re-examined the list of cited literature. In the revised manuscript, we uniformly adopted the form of family names and first letter/letters of the first name/names in the cited literature list. In the future literature citation process, we will pay more attention to the standardization and uniformity of the format.
We would love to thank you for allowing us to resubmit a revised copy of the manuscript and we highly appreciate your time and consideration.
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThis paper examines how can price promotion make consumers more interested? An empirical study from a Chinese supermarket. The overall structure of the study looks good, but some parts need revision in terms of scientific writing. Therefore, there are several issues that need to be addressed in order to improve the quality of the manuscript.
- Maybe to note values in EUR or / $ currency along with yuan currency
- When you use GMM term for the first time in the text note it full meaning
- Why you have used panel data analysis
- 3.1 Econometric Method chapter needs to be shortened.
- It would be useful to show the profile of the supermarkets used in the analysis (turnover; number of employees; …); did you include different supermarkets selling places or you for example used XYZ supermarket available on different locations?
- Is there any limitation of this research? If any, please note.
Overall, I find this manuscript very interesting and contributes to customer research.
Author Response
Dear reviewer，
Thank you very much for your careful review of our paper. Your valuable comments have provided us with great help to further improve our paper. We have read through comments carefully and have made corrections. Based on the instructions provided in your letter, we uploaded the file of the revised manuscript. The responses to your comments are presented following.
Q1: Maybe to note values in EUR or / $ currency along with yuan currency
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. In the original manuscript we did not take into account the universality of monetary units. In the new revised text, we note the conversion of China's currency to the US dollar and the euro. The details are in the footnotes to Table 2., "Yuan" is the common currency unit in China.1 yuan is equal to about 0.139 US dollars and 1 yuan is equal to about 0.127 euros. In future writing, we will pay more attention to the unity and universality of units.
Q2: When you use GMM term for the first time in the text note it full meaning
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. According with the suggestions, we have made a supplementary explanation of the GMM method. This method is briefly described in the new manuscript when GMM first appears in 3.1, which will make it easier for readers to understand our data processing method. The supplementary content is as follows: GMM is a statistical method used to estimate panel data models, which introduces lagged variables by differencing panel data, so that the model includes dynamic characteristics and thus better reflects the relationship between variables. And this method can be taken as a further robust result for better use of different IVs to solve the endogenous problem in the model.
Q3: Why you have used panel data analysis
Response: We are very grateful for the question. In this study, the data we use are sales data from 10 supermarket stores during 26 promotion seasons. The sales data of these 10 stores in the 26 promotion seasons constitute a set of 10*26 panel data, so the panel data model is mainly used in the data analysis of this study. The description of data structure is supplemented in line 302-304 of the revised manuscript. We will be more careful about the data structure in the future.
Q4: 3.1 Econometric Method chapter needs to be shortened.
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. In combination with the suggestions and relevant literature, after retaining the model and variable descriptions corresponding to the empirical regression as well as important calculation formulas, we have deleted some redundant expressions and reduced Section 3.1 as much as possible. We will also pay more attention to concise expression in future writing.
Q5: It would be useful to show the profile of the supermarkets used in the analysis (turnover; number of employees; …); did you include different supermarkets selling places or you for example used XYZ supermarket available on different locations?
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion and highly recognize your suggestions. We think it will be very helpful to further discuss our research content if we analyze the operation data of supermarket stores. However, it is a great pity that we learned from the communication process with the supermarket that their business data and store information cannot be disclosed to us with authorization. Therefore, we cannot analyze the general situation and operation characteristics of supermarkets in the study, which is also the limitation of this study. In order to make up for this deficiency, the population and consumption characteristics of supermarkets are reflected in the equation setting by increasing the population and per capita disposable income of the areas where 10 stores are located. In this study, 10 stores are located in different areas of the same city, so location-related control variables are set among the control variables of the model.
Q6: Is there any limitation of this research? If any, please note.
Response: We are very grateful for the suggestion. In this study, we have two main limitations. The first aspect, as you mentioned above, mainly lies in the lack of information in supermarkets. Due to the privacy of supermarket operation, we cannot obtain more specific operation characteristic data related to each store in supermarkets, so we cannot control some operation index variables in the analysis, which may lead to some errors in our results. Another shortcoming is the lack of information relevant to consumers. We cannot obtain consumer characteristics corresponding to sales records, so the analysis of different consumer purchasing behaviors is not specific enough. In this study, it can only be inferred theoretically that price promotion promotes the purchase behavior of time-sensitive and price-sensitive consumers, but it cannot be tested through empirical analysis. Future research can be extended and expanded in these two aspects. The problem of insufficient information of enterprises can be solved by the research method of case analysis, and consumer research can be carried out for the study of consumer characteristics. The above content is mainly written in part 6 in the new revised manuscript.
We would love to thank you for allowing us to resubmit a revised copy of the manuscript and we highly appreciate your time and consideration.
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe authors addressed my topics, so the article is improved.
