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Keywords
Marketing mix, Marketing theory, History, Consumer behaviour
Abstract
The article provides a nonmainstream discussion the origin and evoltion of efficient consumer responses (ECR) in marketing literature. It challenges generally believed position in the area of the concept. In addition, the novelty value of ECR is questions. The author argues that ECR has parts of its origin and evolution in the managerial school of marekting and in the three calssical schools of marketing, namely the functional school, the commodity school, and the institutional school.
Introduction
Many of today's widespread managerial concepts have been introduced and treated as new-to-the-world. However, this is mostly due to lack of knowledge. Despite the fact that the accumulated knowledge on the subject in literature is enormous, for some reason it is often either forgotten or hidden. Hence, the true origin of managerial concepts is seldom revealed. There have emerged various managerial concepts at different times in the past and new ones will continue to emerge in the future. Most of them are expressed as an abbreviation of two or three letters, for example efficient consumer response (ECR), quick response (QR), just in time (JIT), and supply chain management (SCM).
The objective of this article is to describe the origin and foundations of the ECR, through different eras and areas of marketing theory and marketing thoughts during the twentieth century. Parts of the description in the article follow acknowledged patterns in literature. Others are interpretations by the author in order to propose new evolutionary relationships between different eras and areas of marketing theory and marketing thoughts in relation to ECR. In addition, the content of the article is supported by references in literature and observations collected from leading executives in the Swedish retail industry. In the Swedish retail industry, ECR has, in recent years, gained increasing interest. ECR has also gained worldwide interest in other parts of the world.
The concept of ECR
What, then, is ECR? It might be a short and apparently easy question to answer, but I assure you it is not! If you search for an answer in literature, you will find different definitions, that is different descriptions and explanations of the concept. If you then search for an answer amongst executives in the retail...