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Keywords Reverse logistics, Product life cycle, Retail trade
Abstract Managing the reverse flow of product is an important ability for any company, as the recent experiences of many onine retailers illustrate. Reverse logistics is a growing and important area of strategic advantage for many companies. For a long time, the product fife cycle has been a valuable source of insight about the changing needs of marketing and logistics over the hfe of a product In this paper, we study the way that reverse logistics is impacted by changes in sales over the product's life cycle.
Introduction
In recent years, reverse logistics has been the source of a number of academic papers (Rogers and Tibben-Lembke, 2001; Carter and Ellram, 1998; Tibben-- Lembke, 1998; Kroon and Vrijens, 1995; Pohlen and Farris, 1992), books (Rogers and Tibben-Lembke, 1999a, b; Krikke, 1998; Stock, 1992,1998; Kopicki et al, 1993), and practitioner articles (edd, 2000; Schwartz, 2000; Transport Topics, 1999). Many highly touted online retailers have suffered greatly, because they underestimated the difficulty of reverse logistics (Quick, 1999, 2000; Coleman, 2000).
As the relative newness of this area of research would indicate, many companies are just beginning to understand the importance of reverse logistics, and to grapple with how to best manage their reverse logistics processes. In this paper, we will look at how reverse logistics is impacted by one of the oldest concepts in the management literature: the product life cycle. Practitioners may find that thinking about reverse logistics in terms of the product life cycle leads them to re-think some of their current practices, and academics may be interested to see how much of an impact the widely-- studied product life cycle has on reverse logistics, an emerging area for research.
The outline of the paper is as follows. In the next two sections, brief overviews of reverse logistics and the product life cycle (PLC) are given. Then in the main body of the paper, the reverse logistics challenges in each phase of life are considered, looking at demand from several levels. We then look at the way the life cycles of the components in products impact the reverse logistician's task In the final section, conclusions and future research suggestions are offered.
Reverse logistics and secondary markets
Businesses...