IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/juecon/v90y2015icp60-78.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Information technology and product variety in the city: The case of food trucks

Author

Listed:
  • Anenberg, Elliot
  • Kung, Edward

Abstract

Using the food truck industry as the setting, we provide direct evidence for how information technology can complement consumption variety in cities by reducing spatial information frictions associated with locally produced goods. We document the following facts: (1) food trucks use technology to overcome a spatial information friction; (2) proliferation of technology is related to growth in food trucks; (3) food trucks use their mobility to respond to consumer taste-for-variety; and (4) growth in food trucks is positively correlated with growth in food expenditures away from home. Taken together, our results illustrate how information technology can provide a meaningful increase in variety for urban consumers.

Suggested Citation

  • Anenberg, Elliot & Kung, Edward, 2015. "Information technology and product variety in the city: The case of food trucks," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 60-78.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:juecon:v:90:y:2015:i:c:p:60-78
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jue.2015.09.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119015000649
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jue.2015.09.006?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Edward L. Glaeser, Jed Kolko, and Albert Saiz, 2001. "Consumer city," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 27-50, January.
    2. Sinai, Todd & Waldfogel, Joel, 2004. "Geography and the Internet: is the Internet a substitute or a complement for cities?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 1-24, July.
    3. Gaspar, Jess & Glaeser, Edward L., 1998. "Information Technology and the Future of Cities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 136-156, January.
    4. Waldfogel, Joel, 2003. "Preference Externalities: An Empirical Study of Who Benefits Whom in Differentiated-Product Markets," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 34(3), pages 557-568, Autumn.
    5. Michael Anderson & Jeremy Magruder, 2012. "Learning from the Crowd: Regression Discontinuity Estimates of the Effects of an Online Review Database," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(563), pages 957-989, September.
    6. Train,Kenneth E., 2009. "Discrete Choice Methods with Simulation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521766555, January.
    7. Jenny C. Aker, 2010. "Information from Markets Near and Far: Mobile Phones and Agricultural Markets in Niger," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(3), pages 46-59, July.
    8. Dora L. Costa & Matthew E. Kahn, 2000. "Power Couples: Changes in the Locational Choice of the College Educated, 1940–1990," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(4), pages 1287-1315.
    9. Jeffrey R. Brown & Austan Goolsbee, 2002. "Does the Internet Make Markets More Competitive? Evidence from the Life Insurance Industry," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(3), pages 481-507, June.
    10. Robert Jensen, 2007. "The Digital Provide: Information (Technology), Market Performance, and Welfare in the South Indian Fisheries Sector," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(3), pages 879-924.
    11. Erik Brynjolfsson & Yu (Jeffrey) Hu & Michael D. Smith, 2003. "Consumer Surplus in the Digital Economy: Estimating the Value of Increased Product Variety at Online Booksellers," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(11), pages 1580-1596, November.
    12. Zhi Da & Joseph Engelberg & Pengjie Gao, 2011. "In Search of Attention," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(5), pages 1461-1499, October.
    13. Blakespoor, Elizabeth & Miller, Gregory S. & White, Hal D., 2012. "Dissemination, Direct-Access Information Technology and Information Asymmetry," Research Papers 2106, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    14. Vlastakis, Nikolaos & Markellos, Raphael N., 2012. "Information demand and stock market volatility," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 1808-1821.
    15. Lisa George & Joel Waldfogel, 2003. "Who Affects Whom in Daily Newspaper Markets?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 111(4), pages 765-784, August.
    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. Lichy, Jessica & Dutot, Vincent & Kachour, Maher, 2022. "When technology leads social business: Food truck innovation," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 181(C).
    2. Kuang, Chun, 2017. "Does quality matter in local consumption amenities? An empirical investigation with Yelp," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 1-18.
    3. Elliot Anenberg & Chun Kuang & Edward Kung, 2022. "Social learning and local consumption amenities: Evidence from Yelp," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(2), pages 294-322, June.
    4. Lígia Isoni Auad & Verônica Cortez Ginani & Eliana Dos Santos Leandro & Aline Costa Santos Nunes & Luiz Roberto Pires Domingues Junior & Renata Puppin Zandonadi, 2018. "Who Is Serving Us? Food Safety Rules Compliance Among Brazilian Food Truck Vendors," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-12, December.
    5. Cerdá Suárez, Luis Manuel & Robina Ramírez, Rafael & Palos Sánchez, Pedro Ramiro, 2018. "The influence of health and environment-focused values on restaurateur satisfaction in organic restaurants: a descriptive analysis in Spain," Cuadernos de Gestión, Universidad del País Vasco - Instituto de Economía Aplicada a la Empresa (IEAE).

    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. Chris Forman, 2013. "How has information technology use shaped the geography of economic activity?," Chapters, in: Frank Giarratani & Geoffrey J.D. Hewings & Philip McCann (ed.), Handbook of Industry Studies and Economic Geography, chapter 10, pages 253-270, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Sinai, Todd & Waldfogel, Joel, 2004. "Geography and the Internet: is the Internet a substitute or a complement for cities?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 1-24, July.
    3. repec:oup:ajagec:v:99:y:2017:i:1:p:1-18. is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Hemang Subramanian & Eric Overby, 2017. "Electronic Commerce, Spatial Arbitrage, and Market Efficiency," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 28(1), pages 97-116, March.
    5. Eric Overby & Chris Forman, 2011. "The Effect of Electronic Commerce on Geographic Trade and Price Variance in a Business-to-Business Market," Working Papers 11-30, NET Institute.
    6. Jenny C. Aker & Marcel Fafchamps, 2015. "Mobile Phone Coverage and Producer Markets: Evidence from West Africa," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank Group, vol. 29(2), pages 262-292.
    7. Waldfogel, Joel, 2008. "The median voter and the median consumer: Local private goods and population composition," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 567-582, March.
    8. Jenny C. Aker & Marcel Fafchamps, 2015. "Mobile Phone Coverage and Producer Markets: Evidence from West Africa," World Bank Economic Review, World Bank Group, vol. 29(2), pages 262-292.

    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:eee:juecon:v:90:y:2015:i:c:p:60-78. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622905 .

    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.