Selection Strategies Of Vertical Structure For Competing Retailer-led Closed Loop Supply Chains

With the development of economic globalization,competition in the same industry has gradually transformed from competition among enterprises into competition between supply chains.In this context,this paper studies selection strategies of the vertical structure for two competing retailer-led closed-loop supply chains(CLSCs).Firstly,when the two competing CLSCs select the same collection mode(both two chains select manufacturer-collection mode,retailer-collection mode or third party-collection mode),the optimal pricing strategies,collection rates,chain members' profits and the total system profit under centralized channel structure,decentralized channel structure and hybrid channel structure are examined respectively,and then the equilibrium solutions under three channel structures are compared between different collection modes.Secondly,we extend the model under decentralized channel structure into the case that the two competing CLSCs select different collection modes(one chain selects manufacturer-collection mode,and the other chain selects retailer-collection mode or third party-collection mode).The results show that:(1)when the two competing CLSCs select the same collection mode,from the total system profit's perspective,the centralized channel structure,decentralized channel structure and hybrid channel structure will be the best structure with low competition intensity,moderate competition intensity and high competition intensity,respectively.For consumers' benefit and environmental performance,no matter what competitive intensity between the two CLSCs is,the centralized channel structure is the best,followed by the hybrid channel structure,and the worst is the decentralized channel structure;(2)in decentralized channel structure when the two CLSCs select different collection modes,for the total system profit,the manufacturer-retailer collection mode is better than the manufacturer-third party collection mode when the competitive intensity is low;in contrast,when the competitive intensity is high,the relation is just the opposite.For the consumers' benefits,no matter what competitive intensity between the two CLSCs is,the manufacturer-collection chain under manufacturer-retailer collection mode is the best,whereas the manufacturer-collection chain under manufacturer-third party collection mode is the worst.In the aspect of environmental performance,the total collection rate under the manufacturer-retailer-collection mode is always better than that under the manufacturer-third party collection model.