IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jemstr/v31y2022i2p324-355.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Behavior‐based price discrimination with nonuniform distribution of consumer preferences

Author

Listed:
  • Rosa‐Branca Esteves
  • Qihong Liu
  • Jie Shuai

Abstract

Existing theories of competition with behavior‐based price discrimination (BBPD, also known as price discrimination based on purchase history), typically assume that consumer valuations are distributed uniformly. This assumption implies that the availability of BBPD creates a prisoner's dilemma in which firms are worse off and consumers better off in equilibrium, relative to uniform pricing. In this paper, we consider a wider class of consumer distributions and show that profit and welfare results change qualitatively. When consumers are sufficiently massed at the center of the market (e.g., triangular distribution), BBPD boosts industry profits at the expense of consumers. Otherwise, the usual findings prevail. Our results highlight how assumptions on the density of consumer valuations play a decisive role on pricing and welfare outcomes.

Suggested Citation

  • Rosa‐Branca Esteves & Qihong Liu & Jie Shuai, 2022. "Behavior‐based price discrimination with nonuniform distribution of consumer preferences," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(2), pages 324-355, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jemstr:v:31:y:2022:i:2:p:324-355
    DOI: 10.1111/jems.12466
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jems.12466
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/jems.12466?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Qihong Liu & Konstantinos Serfes, 2004. "Quality of Information and Oligopolistic Price Discrimination," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(4), pages 671-702, December.
    2. Greg Shaffer & Z. John Zhang, 1995. "Competitive Coupon Targeting," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 14(4), pages 395-416.
    3. Drew Fudenberg & Jean Tirole, 2000. "Customer Poaching and Brand Switching," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 31(4), pages 634-657, Winter.
    4. Jiwoong Shin & K. Sudhir & Dae-Hee Yoon, 2012. "When to "Fire" Customers: Customer Cost-Based Pricing," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(5), pages 932-947, May.
    5. Esteves, Rosa-Branca, 2010. "Pricing with customer recognition," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 28(6), pages 669-681, November.
    6. Blundell,Richard & Newey,Whitney K. & Persson,Torsten (ed.), 2006. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521871525.
    7. Thisse, Jacques-Francois & Vives, Xavier, 1988. "On the Strategic Choice of Spatial Price Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(1), pages 122-137, March.
    8. Gehrig, Thomas & Shy, Oz & Stenbacka, Rune, 2011. "History-based price discrimination and entry in markets with switching costs: A welfare analysis," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 732-739, June.
    9. Taylor, Curtis R, 2003. "Supplier Surfing: Competition and Consumer Behavior in Subscription Markets," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 34(2), pages 223-246, Summer.
    10. Greg Shaffer & Z. John Zhang, 2000. "Pay to Switch or Pay to Stay: Preference‐Based Price Discrimination in Markets with Switching Costs," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(3), pages 397-424, June.
    11. Rosa Branca Esteves, 2009. "Customer Poaching And Advertising," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(1), pages 112-146, March.
    12. Esteves, Rosa-Branca & Reggiani, Carlo, 2014. "Elasticity of demand and behaviour-based price discrimination," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 46-56.
    13. Blundell,Richard & Newey,Whitney K. & Persson,Torsten (ed.), 2006. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521692083.
    14. Thomas Gehrig & Rune Stenbacka, 2004. "Differentiation‐Induced Switching Costs and Poaching," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(4), pages 635-655, December.
    15. Yongmin Chen & Jason Pearcy, 2010. "Dynamic pricing: when to entice brand switching and when to reward consumer loyalty," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 41(4), pages 674-685, December.
    16. Kenneth S. Corts, 1998. "Third-Degree Price Discrimination in Oligopoly: All-Out Competition and Strategic Commitment," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 29(2), pages 306-323, Summer.
    17. Yongmin Chen, 1997. "Paying Customers to Switch," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(4), pages 877-897, December.
    18. Thomas Gehrig & Oz Shy & Rune Stenbacka, 2012. "A Welfare Evaluation of History-Based Price Discrimination," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 12(4), pages 373-393, December.
    19. Liu, Qihong & Shuai, Jie, 2013. "Multi-dimensional price discrimination," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 31(5), pages 417-428.
    20. Shy, Oz & Stenbacka, Rune, 2013. "Investment in customer recognition and information exchange," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 92-106.
    21. Oz Shy & Rune Stenbacka, 2011. "Customer recognition and competition," Working Papers 11-7, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    22. Rosa Branca Esteves, 2009. "A Survey on the Economics of Behaviour-Based Price Discrimination," NIPE Working Papers 5/2009, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    23. Chen, Yuxin & Zhang, Z. John, 2009. "Dynamic targeted pricing with strategic consumers," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 43-50, January.
    24. Jiwoong Shin & K. Sudhir, 2010. "A Customer Management Dilemma: When Is It Profitable to Reward One's Own Customers?," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(4), pages 671-689, 07-08.
    25. Anindya Ghose & Ke‐Wei Huang, 2009. "Personalized Pricing and Quality Customization," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(4), pages 1095-1135, December.
    26. J. Miguel Villas-Boas, 1999. "Dynamic Competition with Customer Recognition," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 30(4), pages 604-631, Winter.
    27. Stefano Colombo, 2018. "Behavior‐ and characteristic‐based price discrimination," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(2), pages 237-250, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Li, Jianpei & Zhang, Wanzhu, 2022. "Behavior-based price discrimination and signaling of product quality," MPRA Paper 111572, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Umezawa, Masashi, 2022. "Behavior-based price discrimination in a horizontally and vertically differentiated duopoly with switching costs," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Esteves, Rosa-Branca, 2014. "Behavior-based price discrimination with retention offers," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 39-51.
    2. Rosa Branca Esteves, 2013. "Customer Poaching with Retention Strategies," NIPE Working Papers 02/2013, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    3. Esteves, Rosa-Branca & Resende, Joana, 2019. "Personalized pricing and advertising: Who are the winners?," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 239-282.
    4. Rosa-Branca Esteves, "undated". "Behaviour-Based Price Discrimination with Retention Offers," NIPE Working Papers 09/2014, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    5. Umezawa, Masashi, 2022. "Behavior-based price discrimination in a horizontally and vertically differentiated duopoly with switching costs," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    6. Bernard Caillaud & Romain de Nijs, 2011. "Strategic loyalty reward in dynamic price Discrimination," Working Papers halshs-00622291, HAL.
    7. Bernard Caillaud & Romain de Nijs, 2011. "Strategic loyalty reward in dynamic price Discrimination," PSE Working Papers halshs-00622291, HAL.
    8. Rosa Branca Esteves, 2009. "A Survey on the Economics of Behaviour-Based Price Discrimination," NIPE Working Papers 5/2009, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    9. Jeong, Yuncheol & Maruyama, Masayoshi, 2018. "Positioning and pricing strategies in a market with switching costs and staying costs," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 47-57.
    10. Rosa‐Branca Esteves & Helder Vasconcelos, 2015. "Price Discrimination under Customer Recognition and Mergers," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(3), pages 523-549, September.
    11. Bernard Caillaud & Romain De Nijs, 2014. "Strategic Loyalty Reward in Dynamic Price Discrimination," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 33(5), pages 725-742, September.
    12. De Nijs, Romain, 2017. "Behavior-based price discrimination and customer information sharing," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 319-334.
    13. Romain de Nijs, 2015. "Behavior-based price discrimination and customer information sharing," PSE Working Papers hal-01226250, HAL.
    14. Baye, Irina & Reiz, Tim & Sapi, Geza, 2018. "Customer recognition and mobile geo-targeting," DICE Discussion Papers 285, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE).
    15. Esteves, Rosa-Branca, 2010. "Pricing with customer recognition," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 28(6), pages 669-681, November.
    16. Rosa Brana Esteves & Joana Resende, 2017. "Personalized Pricing with Targeted Advertising: Who are the Winners?," NIPE Working Papers 02/2017, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    17. Flavio Pino, 2022. "The microeconomics of data – a survey," Economia e Politica Industriale: Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, Springer;Associazione Amici di Economia e Politica Industriale, vol. 49(3), pages 635-665, September.
    18. Romain de Nijs, 2015. "Behavior-based price discrimination and customer information sharing," Working Papers hal-01226250, HAL.
    19. Thomas Gehrig & Oz Shy & Rune Stenbacka, 2012. "A Welfare Evaluation of History-Based Price Discrimination," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 12(4), pages 373-393, December.
    20. Rosa-Branca Esteves & Sofia Cerqueira, "undated". "Behaviour-Based Price Discrimination under Advertising and Imperfectly Informed Consumers," NIPE Working Papers 08/2014, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D43 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Oligopoly and Other Forms of Market Imperfection
    • L13 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Oligopoly and Other Imperfect Markets
    • M31 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Marketing and Advertising - - - Marketing

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jemstr:v:31:y:2022:i:2:p:324-355. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/research/journals/JEMS/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.