To address a gap in the literature that deals with official quality labels, the article proposes a methodology for analysis and a conceptual framework that are subsequently applied to two such quality labels from the south west region of France : ‘Volaille Fermières des Landes’ and...

This paper contains an analysis of a quality ladders growth model with firm-level decreasing returns R&D technology. This analysis explains the relationship between competition in R&D races and firm R&D efforts. While competition proves to have a positive effect on industry growth rates, the...

Customer satisfaction is central to strategic management oriented to quality. The quality of products/services generates, in fact, the customer satisfaction. The aim of the research is to demonstrate the existence of a linear dependence between quality and customer satisfaction. The survey tool...

This paper reports results from a laboratory experiment exploring the relationship between reputation and entry in procurement. There is widespread concern among regulators that favoring suppliers with good past performance, a standard practice in private procurement, may hinder entry by new...

Firms signal high quality through high prices even if the market structure is highly competitive and price competition is severe. In a symmetric Bertrand oligopoly where products may differ only in their quality, production cost is increasing in quality and the quality of each firm’s product...

The quality of output is of great concern to firms, consumers and regulators and yet firms' decisions concerning quality receive far less attention from economists than quantity or pricing decisions. There is a substantial management literature on product quality which, to some extent, discusses...

Two firms produce a good with a horizontal and a vertical characteristic called quality. The difference in the unobservable quality levels determines how the firms share the market. We consider two scenarios: in the first one, firms disclose quality; in the second one, they send costly signals...

This article analyzes hospital privatization by comparing costs and quality between different ownership forms. We put the attention on the distinction between public hospitals and private hospitals with public funding. Using information about Spanish hospitals, we have found that private...

Can an increasing number of firms and brands exacerbate problems related to asymmetric information on product quality?. This working paper analyzes this trade-off between variety and information using Salop's (1979) framework by introducing quality uncertainty and a simple information diffusion...

The environment is an essential element of human existence and is the result of combining natural elements with elements created by human activity. All this interact and influence the living conditions and opportunities for future development of the whole society. Quality of products and...