Comparative efficiencies of specialty coffee retailers from the perspectives of socially responsible global sourcing

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to illuminate light on the assessment of operating efficiency of specialty coffee retailers from the perspective of socially responsible global sourcing. This paper evaluates the impact of socially responsible sourcing on the operating efficiencies of specialty coffee retailers before and after implementing fair‐trade practices and compares the operating efficiencies of fair‐trade coffee retailers to those of non‐fair‐trade coffee retailers.Design/methodology/approach – The paper proposes data envelopment analysis (DEA) to measure the comparative efficiency of seven specialty coffee retailers, relative to prior periods and their key competitors. It develops the Charnes‐Cooper‐Rhodes (CCR) model that is designed to derive weights without their being fixed in advance. The CCR version of DEA is adopted to assess the impact of the coffee retailers' policy initiatives (i.e. fair‐trade practices) on their efficiency and measure the change over time (i.e. before and after f...

[1]  H D Sherman,et al.  Evaluating and marketing efficient physicians toward competitive advantage. , 1994, Health care strategic management.

[2]  Abraham Charnes,et al.  Measuring the efficiency of decision making units , 1978 .

[3]  W. Ouchi,et al.  JAPANESE-STYLE PARTNERSHIPS -- GIVING COMPANIES A COMPETITIVE EDGE. , 1993 .

[4]  M. Farrell.  The Measurement of Productive Efficiency , 1957 .

[5]  N. Smith,et al.  Corporate Social Responsibility: Whether or How? , 2003 .

[6]  Hau L. Lee.  Embedding sustainability: lessons from the front line , 2008 .

[7]  Bradley D. Parrish,et al.  What Tanzania's coffee farmers can teach the world: a performance-based look at the fair trade–free trade debate , 2005 .

[8]  A. Charnes,et al.  Some Models for Estimating Technical and Scale Inefficiencies in Data Envelopment Analysis , 1984 .

[9]  Hokey Min,et al.  International Purchasing Strategies of Multinational U.S. Firms , 1991 .

[10]  James R. Stock,et al.  Marketing myopia revisited: lessons for logistics , 2002 .

[11]  Paul M. Swamidass,et al.  Import Sourcing Dynamics: An Integrative Perspective , 1993 .

[12]  B. Casu,et al.  A comparative study of efficiency in European banking , 2003 .

[13]  Marie McHugh,et al.  Partnership Sourcing: An Organization Change Management Perspective , 2000 .

[14]  M. Littrell,et al.  Social Responsibility in the Global Market: Fair Trade of Cultural Products , 1999 .

[15]  Mette Andersen,et al.  Corporate social responsibility in global supply chains , 2009 .

[16]  Gavin L. Fox,et al.  Supply management ethical responsibility: reputation and performance impacts , 2009 .

[17]  Marc Vilanova,et al.  Exploring the Nature of the Relationship Between CSR and Competitiveness , 2008 .

[18]  M. Kotabe,et al.  Global sourcing strategy and sustainable competitive advantage , 2003, Industrial Marketing Management.

[19]  Gregory Dicum,et al.  The coffee book : anatomy of an industry from the crop to the last drop , 1999 .

[20]  H. Sherman,et al.  Managing Bank Productivity Using Data Envelopment Analysis DEA , 1995 .

[21]  Jeffrey H. Dyer.  Specialized supplier networks as a source of competitive advantage : Evidence from the auto industry , 1996 .

[22]  Kevin Cullinane,et al.  The relationship between privatization and DEA estimates of efficiency in the container port industry , 2005 .

[23]  Zach G. Zacharia,et al.  DEFINING SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT , 2001 .

[24]  G. D. Ferrier,et al.  Do mergers improve hospital productivity? , 2004, J. Oper. Res. Soc..

[25]  Hsuan-Lien Chu,et al.  The Initial Effects of Physician Compensation Programs in Taiwan Hospitals: Implications for Staff Model HMOs , 2003, Health care management science.

[26]  Sherwood C. Frey,et al.  ABB AND FORD -- CREATING VALUE THROUGH COOPERATION. , 1993 .

[27]  J. Chilingerian.  Evaluating physician efficiency in hospitals : a multivariate analysis of best practices , 1995 .

[28]  Kate Bird,et al.  Ethical Consumerism: The Case Of “Fairly–Traded” Coffee , 1997 .

[29]  Jill Johnes,et al.  Measuring Efficiency: A Comparison of Multilevel Modelling and Data Envelopment Analysis in the Context of Higher Education , 2006 .

[30]  William W. Cooper,et al.  Introduction to Data Envelopment Analysis and Its Uses: With Dea-Solver Software and References , 2005 .

[31]  M. Porter,et al.  Strategy and society: the link between competitive advantage and corporate social responsibility. , 2006, Harvard business review.

[32]  Cecil C. Bozarth,et al.  Stages of global sourcing strategy evolution: an exploratory study , 1998 .

[33]  Frederic H. Murphy,et al.  Compensating for non-homogeneity in decision-making units in data envelopment analysis , 2003, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[34]  Ch'en Chi-Shih,et al.  Foreign Trade Statistics , 1970 .

[35]  Anne Graham,et al.  Airport benchmarking: a review of the current situation , 2005 .

[36]  Jayashree Mahajan,et al.  A data envelopment analytic model for assessing the relative efficiency of the selling function , 1991 .

[37]  P. Argenti.  Collaborating with Activists: How Starbucks Works with NGOs , 2004 .

[38]  A. Hira,et al.  Fair Trade: Three Key Challenges for Reaching the Mainstream , 2006 .

[39]  D. Giovannucci.  Sustainable Coffee Survey of the North American Specialty Coffee Industry , 2001 .

[40]  Esben Rahbek Gjerdrum Pedersen.  The many and the few: rounding up the SMEs that manage CSR in the supply chain , 2009 .

[41]  Patrick De Pelsmacker,et al.  Consumer preferences for the marketing of ethically labelled coffee , 2005 .

[42]  Barry Wilkinson,et al.  Buyer-supplier relations in the UK - automotive industry: Strategic implications of the Japanese manufacturing model , 1992 .

[43]  H. Walker,et al.  Sustainable procurement in the United Kingdom public sector , 2009 .

[44]  Ki‐Hoon Lee,et al.  Current Status of CSR in the Realm of Supply Management: the Case of the Korean Electronics Industry , 2009 .

[45]  Patrick De Pelsmacker,et al.  Do Consumers Care about Ethics? Willingness to Pay for Fair‐Trade Coffee , 2005 .

[46]  Mari Sako,et al.  Supplier Relations in Japan and the United States , 1995 .

[47]  Emmanuel Thanassoulis,et al.  Separating Market Efficiency from Profitability and its Implications for Planning , 1995 .

[48]  Joe Zhu,et al.  Evaluation of information technology investment: a data envelopment analysis approach , 2006, Comput. Oper. Res..

[49]  Hokey Min,et al.  Benchmarking the operational efficiency of third party logistics providers using data envelopment analysis , 2006 .

[50]  Laura T. Raynolds,et al.  Keeping trade fair: governance challenges in the fair trade coffee initiative , 2005 .

[51]  S. Rajagopal,et al.  Global Procurement: Motivations and Strategy , 1994 .