Qualitätsmanagement ist wieder in aller Munde. Der Spielzeugwarenhersteller Mattel war erst unlängst gezwungen, 21 Millionen in China produzierte Spielzeuge zurückzurufen. Die Gründe lagen beispielsweise in unzulässig hohem Bleigehalt in den Farben und in der Verschluckungsgefahr von...

We propose a framework for analyzing transformations of demand. Such transformations frequently stem from changes in the dispersion of consumers` valuations, which lead to rotations of the demand curve. In a wide variety of settings, profits are a U-shaped function of dispersion. A high level of...

This paper considers the impact of reviewers on sales of products of quality unknown to consumers. Sales occur simultaneously after consideration by a reviewer with a known level of bias. Consumers observe the reviewer`s decision and a private signal. We find that: (a) with flexible prices and...

In this article we provide a seminal academic investigation of mo-bile telephony consumers' perception of the recently introduced costcap tari in comparison to corresponding pay-per-use and atrate call-ing plans. Previous studies have identied several psychological eectsthrough which consumers...