Managing Sustainability: Perspectives from Retailing and Services

Companies and policy makers are prioritizing environmental, social, and governance goals as part of their strategies. Academic research has started to focus on these issues, but many important matters require deeper investigation and reflection, especially in specific sectors. This book focuses on the sustainability issues within the retailing and services sectors. Starting the discussion around research-knowledge on CSR, the authors discuss the strategic aspects of managing sustainability in retailing and service companies and offer recommendations to effectively manage the marketing levers for sustainability.

Readers will benefit from an in-depth analysis of the social responsibility practices of major retailers and their strategies. The authors also take an inside view of CSR by studying the angles of employee perception and job satisfaction, financial performance, and the more recent impact of COVID-19. Using this approach, they highlight the system of relationships existing between stakeholder-related concepts and organizational factors and how they affect sustainability strategy.

Beatrice Luceri is a full professor in the scientific-disciplinary sector SECS-P/08 - economics and business management in the Department of Economics and Management at the University of Parma (Italy). She currently teaches consumer behavior analysis and international marketing at master’s levels. Her research interests are related to retail marketing, logistics, and neuromarketing. She is the author of numerous scientific articles published in national and international journals, as well as several monographs on the topics of market research (Prospettive della ricerca di marketing published by Egea, Milan, Italy) and analysis of consumer behavior (Teste tempestose. Capire il consumatore: dal comportamentismo al neuromarketing, with Cristina Zerbini and published by Giappichelli, Turin, Italy); international marketing (Marketing Internazionale. Strategie, Principi e Appplicazioni, with Ilan Alon, Eugene Jaffe, Christiane Prange, and Donata Vianelli and published by Giappichelli, Turin, Italy); logistics (Network Marketing; Logistica e marketing. Filiera, valore, relazioni published by Egea, Milan, Italy); and print media industry (I giorni della carta stampata published by Egea, Milan, Italy).

Elisa Martinelli is Full Professor of Management in the Department of Economics Marco Biagi at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (UNIMORE, Italy), where she teaches management, and trade marketing and sales management. She is the head of the master’s degree course in international management and the departmental delegate for international relations. Her work is concerned with consumer behavior, channel and retail management, and business resilience/disaster management. She also studies brand extension and private labels, as well as the country of origin effect. She has published in a variety of leading academic journals, including The Service Industries Journal, the Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, the International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, the International Review of Retail, Distribution and Consumer Research, the International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, the International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, the Journal of International Consumer Marketing, and the British Food Journal.