• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.31-43
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• 2018

Purpose - We examine how a Korean retail firm's social responsibility is related to its financial performances. The traditional view of corporation expects a negative relationship, while the stakeholder theory expects a positive one. Research design, data, and methodology - We adopt the ESG score, published by Korean Corporate Governance Service to measure the level of socially responsible activity for the Korean retail firms. The ordinary least square method is adopted to investigate this relationship. The publicly traded retail firms are examined from 2011 to 2016. Results - We find that the total ESG score is negatively related to ROE but shows no statistically significant relationship with ROA and Tobin's Q value. However, a firm's environmental score is negatively related with both of ROE and ROA. Its social score is no conclusive relationship with the performance measures. The governance score is negatively related to the value of Tobin's Q. Conclusions - This paper generally supports the traditional view of corporate theory, especially in terms of ROE. This evidence is not well aligned with the existing study for Korean corporations generally documenting positive relationships. We find almost no empirical evidence supporting the stakeholder theory of corporation in the Korean retail industry.

• Journal of Korean Society for Quality Management
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.102-116
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• 2008

The most widely used models to study the quality of service are the SERVQUAL and SERVPERF models that measure service mechanisms. This paper is to estimate service efficiency and consistency for Retail Industry. We tried to measure the service quality and overall satisfaction by using DEA and PCI, degree of combination and top2box which is a little bit different methodology from traditional ones. Rather than using the usual method of converting the service quality index by mean value, the Service Efficiency Index(SEI) and Service Quality Consistency Index(SQCI) are used to measure the efficiency and consistency level, which in turn can be used as the new service quality indices. The result of SEI and SQCI show the efficiency frontier in retail industry that 6 DMUs are analyzed relative efficient DMUs, 12DMUs are inefficient DMUs and retail Industry consistency level appeared low(0.35-0.47) Also, there is a significant difference in terms of efficiency and consistency in the each retail industry. Finally, we showed the summarized result as the Effi-Con Matrix.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.13-21
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• 2021

Purpose: The sports leadership theories are crucial in ensuring the success of corporations. This study shall discuss the various leadership theories employed in the sports industry and how they can be incorporated within the retailing sector to enhance the service quality and promote substantial customer value towards all the consumers visiting the retailing stores. Research design, data and methodology: The present researcher gathered textual data on potential solutions for coding of development through web searching method and coded and produced various topics as solution providers. Methods were then established to enhance quality on customer value by the leadership within their businesses, and the researcher subsequently presented the findings. Results: This study provides a total of nine solutions which are helpful systemically for practitioners in the retailer service sector. These numerous solutions can be incorporated within the retail industry through the sports leadership theories employed in the sports industry to help achieve a full and strong customer value. Conclusions: Finally, the present study concludes that the retail industry and management need to ensure that a substantial customer value is built through high-quality services rendered towards the clientele base, employing sports leadership theories such as path-goal, authentic leadership, transformation, situational and leader-member exchange theories.

• The Journal of Economics, Marketing and Management
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.45-55
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• 2023

Purpose: As one of the continuous studies on the offline distribution industry, the purpose of this study is to find ways for offline stores to respond to the growth of online shopping by identifying research trends on department stores. Research design, data and methodology: To this end, this study conducted word frequency analysis, word co-occurrence frequency analysis, BERTopic, LDA, and dynamic topic modeling using Python 3.7 on a total of 551 English abstracts searched with the keyword 'department store' in scienceON as of October 10, 2022. Results: The results of word frequency analysis and co-occurrence frequency analysis revealed that research related to department stores frequently focuses on factors such as customers, consumers, products, satisfaction, services, and quality. BERTopic and LDA analyses identified five topics, including 'store image,' with 'shopping information' showing relatively high interest, while 'sales systems' were observed to have relatively lower interest. Conclusions: Based on the results of this study, it was concluded that research related to department stores has so far been conducted in a limited scope, and it is insufficient to provide clues for department stores to secure competitiveness against online platforms. Therefore, it is suggested that additional research be conducted on topics such as the true role of department stores in the retail industry, consumer reinterpretation, customer value and lifetime value, department stores as future retail spaces, ethical management, and transparent ESG management.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.30 no.11 s.158
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• pp.1495-1506
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• 2006

The purposes of this study are to investigate the formation and the change of apparel retail structure historically with the viewpoint that the retail structure is affected by the process of economic development. This study was done by literature research method and the result of this study is the following. The tailor and seamstress shops, the first clothing shops in Korea, were replaced by ready-made shops, because mass production system which had developed with the industrialization of Korea increased the advantage of economy of scale compared to handicrafts individual one. After that, the production system of apparel industry had been efficient continuously, while retail system had not. The retailing of famous brand apparel conducted by exclusive franchise store caused supplier oriented markets where the opinion and the desire of consumers were not reflected. While the retailing of the unknown brand apparel handled by small retail stores were inefficient. As the apparel industry matured in 1990s, various types of new stores appeared such as specialty stores, discount stores, TV home shopping, internet shopping, outlet malls, and big fashion stores in Dongdeamoon. These new stores have features of seeking profits in mass merchandising. As these large retail stores grow, the apparel retail structure of Korea is changing from a fragmented market to a vertically integrated one. This change is shown by the decrease of stores per inhabitants. With the change of environment, the apparel retail system which has lagged behind comparatively is expected to develop into more efficient system based on the large capital investment which raise the advantage of economy of scale.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.171-192
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• 2011

This paper focuses on the retail industry of industrial share of the GDP, productivity of distribution industry and input-out analysis between Korea and Japan, also results are summarized as follows. First, the share of GDP in agriculture, forestry and fisheries of the both countries is falling. That of manufacture increases in South Korea, while Japan is falling. While distribution industry shows vice versa. Employed population by industry is falling both countries also. The relative labor productivity shows that agriculture, forestry and fisheries, retail industry needs more labor, while manufacture has been met for both countries. Second, compare to Japan, the retail industry of Korea has been increased since 1990. Likewise, overall productivity of distribution industry in Korea has been increased while almost that of Japan has declined. Third, production inducement effects of Japan are greater than that of Korea. On the other hand, import inducement effects show vice versa. Fourth, as shown from the final demand of distribution industry and the rate of dependence on production inducement, we can see that the “increase in stocks” increases while gross government fixed capital formation shows vice versa. Korea's private consumption expenditure increases while Japan shows versa. South Korea's government consumption expenditure and exports are rising, on the other hand, that of Japan is declining. Fifth, the rate of dependence on distribution industry and import inducement shows the same tendency from both countries. As we can see from the private consumption expenditure, government consumption expenditure, gross government fixed capital formation, gross private fixed capital formation, increase in stocks, the rate of dependence on import inducement is more effective than the rate of dependence on production inducement. While the exports are comparatively ineffective. Sixth, the degrees of influence of retail industry are similar between Korea and Japan, while sensitivity of the Korean industry has been weakened. In this sense, strong policies are needed to boost the industry. Seventh, the investments in the retail industry of Korea showed the public-led trend, while Japan showed private sector-led investment trend. The investment trend of Korea's retail industry will be switched into private sector-led investment step by step in the future. This finding will be an important clue to set the policy direction of Korea distribution industry. Finally, both Korea and Japan are still in need of employment in retail industry. Not addressed in this paper, such as value-added-induced effects, employment inducement effect, will be remaining challenges in the following paper.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.70-79
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• 2010

There has been some research conducted that addressed immoral consumer behaviors in Korea; however, most of this research focused on purchasing counterfeits or shoplifting. High return rates of apparel and used apparel returns have been acknowledged as problem areas within the fashion industry. However, very few researchers have addressed this issue. Therefore, the goal of this research was to explore consumer's retail borrowing experience using a mixed methods approach. In study 1 Korean consumer's retail borrowing experiences was explored through focus group interviews. Findings informed study 2 an examination of apparel consumers' attitudes toward retail borrowing behavior via an online survey. Findings assist both researchers' and practitioners' understanding of retail borrowing behaviors and provide insight into retail borrowing issues in the apparel retail industry. For study 1, five focus-group interviews were conducted with seven panels of individuals that had retail borrowing experience within the past year. Thirty-five Korean consumers who lived in a metropolitan area participated in the focus group interviews. Most of consumers were in their 20's (n=21) and were women (n=24). Most participants purchased apparel items from a retail store and returned the worn items for either a full refund or exchanged the worn item for another item. Motives underlying retail borrowing behavior included social needs, job-related needs, fashion needs, and "smart shopping." Similar to existing research findings from other countries, social needs were the most frequently mentioned cause of retail borrowing in fashion stores. Consumers' moral values, attitude toward large corporations, and prior retail borrowing experience were mentioned as possible factors affecting consumers' retail borrowing behavior. For study 2, the questionnaire used to gather the data was developed based on the findings of part I and existing research. Questions concerning consumers' moral beliefs, sensation seeking tendencies, self-worth, past retail job experience, retail borrowing experience, and some demographic characteristics were included in the questionnaire. The data were collected via an online survey using an online panel provided by a commercial online research company located in Seoul, Korea. In order to obtain various consumers, a quota sample was (male: female=1:1, 20's:30's:40's=1:1:1, retail experience: no retail experience=1:3) obtained from the company. A total of 401 consumers who had shopped for apparel items during the prior 6 months participated in the online survey. The results indicated that 19.7% of the respondents reported they had experience borrowing fashion merchandise. Among these individuals, male borrowers (57%) outnumbered female borrowers. In terms of age distribution, x2 revealed that there was a statistical difference between respondents with and without retail borrowing experiences: 41.8% of the respondents with retail borrowing experience were in their 40's, while respondents without retail borrowing experience were evenly distributed between their 20's to 40's. There was also a significant difference between respondents with and without retail borrowing experience in terms of income: respondents with retail borrowing experience tended to have higher incomes than those without retail borrowing experience. T-tests were performed to compare respondents' fashion shopping behavior, moral beliefs, sensation-seeking tendencies, and attitudes toward retail borrowing behavior between participants with and without retail borrowing experience. As compared to those with no borrowing experience, respondents with experience tended to shop for fashion items more frequently and spent more on shopping for fashion items. Consumers with experience borrowing tended to have higher sensation-seeking tendencies than consumers without retail borrowing experience. A regression analysis revealed that attitudes toward fashion retail borrowing were negatively related to consumers' moral beliefs, but positively related to monthly fashion shopping frequency, sensation-seeking tendencies, and past fashion retail borrowing experience. Among these variables, past retail borrowing experience was the most significant predictor, followed by moral beliefs. This research serves as an initial attempt to address the motives that underlie retail borrowing behaviors and the factors affecting those behaviors. The findings of this study may facilitate an understanding of the consumer's retail borrowing, which will provide a basis for approaches that may help decrease retail borrowing and inappropriate returns at fashion retail stores. The findings may also provide materials for consumer education over the long term. In order to better understand fashion retail borrowing behavior, more research is needed in the future.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.69-77
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• 2015

Purpose - The purpose of this study is to examine whether the cash policies of retail firms listed on Korean stock markets are consistent with the evidence provided in the study of Almeida et al. (2004). Liquidity management is an important issue for financially constrained firms relative to financially unconstrained firms. Because there are few sources of external funding, the optimal liquidity policies of financially constrained firms should reflect their own earnings or cash inflows to create opportunities for current and future real investments. According to this simple idea, we estimate the sensitivity of cash to cash flows and simply check whether the estimated sensitivity to cash flows of the cash retained by constrained retail firms is greater than that of the cash retained by unconstrained retail firms. Through this work, we aim to explain why the cash policies of the retail firms listed on the Korean stock markets differ from those of listed manufacturing enterprises. Research design, data, and methodology - To explain a firm's cash holdings, we use only three explanatory variables: earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT), Tobin's q, and size. All the variables are defined as the value of the numerator divided by aggregate assets. Thanks to this definition, it is possible to treat all the sample firms as a single large firm. The sample financial data for this study are collected from the retail enterprises listed on the KOSPI and KOSDAQ markets from 1991 to 2013. We can obtain these data from WISEfn, the financial information company. This study's methodology has its origin in Keynes's simple idea of precautionary liquidity demand: When a firm faces financial constraints, cash savings from earnings or cash inflows become important from the corporate finance perspective. Following this simple idea, Almeida et al. (2004) developed their theoretical model and found empirical evidence that the sensitivity of cash to cash flows varies systematically according to different types of financing frictions. To find more empirical evidence for this idea, we examined the cash flow sensitivity of the cash held by Korean retail firms. Results - Through several robustness tests, we empirically showed that financially constrained Korean retail firms display significant positive propensity to save cash from earnings before interest and taxes, while the estimated cash flow sensitivity of the cash held by unconstrained retail firms is not significant. Despite the relatively low earnings of retail firms, their sensitivity is three times greater than that of manufacturing enterprises. This implies that Korean retail firms have greater intentions of facilitating future investments rather than current investments. Conclusions - The characteristics of the cash policies of Korean retail firms differ from those of manufacturing firms. This contrast may be attributable to industry-oriented policy planning, regulations, and institutional differences. However, the industrial policymakers should observe signals of the long-term growth options of retail firms based on their high propensity to save from their cash inflows.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.10
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• pp.297-303
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• 2021

The performance of the retail industry in a country, which simultaneously reflects the demand for retail space, is significantly influenced by the macroeconomic environment of said country. However, in the case of Malaysia, studies regarding this issue are limited. Therefore, this paper aims to identify the macroeconomic determinants of the demand for retail space in shopping centers in Malaysia through the study of six variables: per capita income, private expenditure, inflation rate, interest rate, total population, and the number of tourists arrival. The nexus between these variables and the demand for retail space in shopping centers were examined by cointegration and causality tests, and regression analysis using quarterly data for the period 1993Q1 to 2016Q4. The results from bivariate cointegration tests indicate that inflation rate, interest rates, population size, and the number of tourists arrival have significant long-run relationships with the demand for retail space of Malaysian shopping centers. Meanwhile, the Granger causality tests show that only population size can cause the demand for shopping centers' retail space. Finally, the results from the regression analysis revealed that income per capita, private expenditure, interest rates, and population are the variables that significantly influence the demand for the retail space of the Malaysian shopping centers.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.131-138
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• 2024

Purpose: This study aims to fill the existing gap in the existing literature by investigating the mediating effect of psychological empowerment between leadership and motivation for workers at retail stores, and to extend the previous research to determine the preferences of the researchers and practitioners in leadership and employee motivation in retail through a systematic approach. Research design, data and methodology: This study used a systematic approach to the mediation effect of psychological empowerment on the relationship between leadership and employee motivation in retail stores. To ensure completeness, systematization, and transparency, the preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) approach was applied. Results: The research findings (Total Four Mediating Roles) suggest that psychological empowerment may mediate between leadership and employee motivation. These mediation roles (Empowering Leadership Styles, Organizational Culture and Psychological Empowerment, Customer Psychological Empowerment, and High-Performance Work Systems (HPWS) and Psychological Empowerment) will help practitioners comprehend how these empowerment and motivation leadership styles are interconnected in the retail industry. Conclusions: The research results indicate that psychological empowerment is essential for employee motivation in the retail sector. Through this knowledge, retail store managers can implement strategies designed to empower employees and create a motivated workforce, bolstering organizational effectiveness.