Game study on new products'advance selling strategies in the apparel industry considering the inventory risk
With the popularization of the internet and smart mobile devices,E-commerce has developed rapidly.In 2022,China's online retail sales accounted for 27% of total social retail sales,among which clothing,shoes and hats were one of the main categories of online transactions.According to a survey by iiMedia Research,the proportion of online clothing consumption reached 62% in 2022,and more and more consumers are accustomed to purchasing clothing through E-commerce channels.However,it is difficult for online businesses to provide physical try-on experiences,and consumers may find their expectation inconsistent with the actual wearing effect,leading to high return rates.The return rate of E-commerce clothing companies is often as high as 30% or more.Due to the characteristics of clothing itself,the value of inventory decreases rapidly over time,and the high return rate aggravates the risk of inventory,which may bring losses to enterprises.To alleviate inventory risks associated with high return rates,some clothing companies have tried an extra-long period advance selling model.By significantly extending the advance selling period and sequentially delivering goods in batches during the advance selling period,clothing companies can use the returns of previous orders to fulfill subsequent orders in the hope of reducing inventory risks.To explore the effectiveness of an extra-long period advance selling strategy in reducing inventory risks,the article constructed a theoretical model based on the classical newsvendor model by taking into account the uncertainty of consumer demand during the advance selling period and the waiting cost associated with their patience,according to the characteristics of the apparel industry.Firstly,the profit functions under normal advance selling and extra-long period advance selling strategies were constructed respectively to solve the optimal output,and the former strategy was taken as a benchmark for comparison.Secondly,the article compared the pricing,production quantity and profits under the two strategies and made a detailed analysis of the impacts of product cost and residual value,standard deviation of demand,duration of extra-long advance selling period as well as consumer patience on the optimal production quantity and profits by numerical analysis,and the feasible conditions for the two strategies were also discussed.Finally,the article constructed an expected residual inventory rate to evaluate the inventory risks under the two strategies and measure the effectiveness of the extra-long period advance selling strategy in reducing inventory risks.The study results show that if the demand uncertainty is large and the product residual value is small,clothing companies can consider implementing the advance selling strategy with an extra-long period so as to reduce their inventory risks,but it is necessary to consider the degree of consumer patience and set the advance selling period within a reasonable range.The extra-long period advance selling strategy proves effective in reducing inventory risks,which can provide reference for clothing companies with high inventory risks and help them to develop more applicable advance selling strategies and improving the performance of inventory management.In the future,we will try to consider customer groups with heterogeneous patience levels and competitive markets,hoping to obtain more abundant conclusions.
万方数据
维普
