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Technical Note—Dynamic Pricing with Gain-Seeking Reference Price Effects

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  • Zhenyu Hu

    (Department of Decision Sciences, NUS Business School, National University of Singapore, Singapore 119245)

  • Xin Chen

    (Department of Industrial Enterprise and Systems Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801)

  • Peng Hu

    (School of Management, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, 430074 Wuhan, China)

Abstract

We study a dynamic pricing problem of a firm facing reference price effects at an aggregate demand level, where demand is more sensitive to gains than losses. We find that even the myopic pricing strategy belongs to one type of discontinuous maps, which can exhibit complex dynamics over time. Our numerical examples show that, in general, the optimal pricing strategies may not admit any simple characterizations and the resulting reference price/price dynamics can be very complicated. We then show for a special case that a cyclic skimming pricing strategy is optimal, and we provide conditions to guarantee the optimality of high-low pricing strategies.

Suggested Citation

  • Zhenyu Hu & Xin Chen & Peng Hu, 2016. "Technical Note—Dynamic Pricing with Gain-Seeking Reference Price Effects," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 64(1), pages 150-157, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:oropre:v:64:y:2016:i:1:p:150-157
    DOI: 10.1287/opre.2015.1445
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

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    3. Cao, Ping & Zhao, Nenggui & Wu, Jie, 2019. "Dynamic pricing with Bayesian demand learning and reference price effect," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 279(2), pages 540-556.
    4. Salgado Alfredo, 2022. "Regulation through Reference Prices," Working Papers 2022-05, Banco de México.
    5. Yiwei Chen & Vivek F. Farias & Nikolaos Trichakis, 2019. "On the Efficacy of Static Prices for Revenue Management in the Face of Strategic Customers," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(12), pages 5535-5555, December.
    6. Guang Yang & Ying Wang & Mulin Liu, 2023. "Optimal Policy for Probabilistic Selling with Three-Way Revenue Sharing Contract under the Perspective of Sustainable Supply Chain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-22, February.
    7. Junhai Ma & Zhanbing Guo, 2017. "Implications for Firms with Limited Information to Take Advantage of Reference Price Effect in Competitive Settings," Complexity, Hindawi, vol. 2017, pages 1-16, June.
    8. Turunç Ömer & Karayalçın Cem, 2024. "Bridging Brand Parity with Insights Regarding Consumer Behavior," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 18(1), pages 1-10, January.
    9. Chenavaz, Régis & Paraschiv, Corina, 2018. "Dynamic pricing for inventories with reference price effects," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 12, pages 1-16.
    10. Bertrand Crettez & Naila Hayek & Georges Zaccour, 2020. "Existence and characterization of optimal dynamic pricing strategies with reference-price effects," Central European Journal of Operations Research, Springer;Slovak Society for Operations Research;Hungarian Operational Research Society;Czech Society for Operations Research;Österr. Gesellschaft für Operations Research (ÖGOR);Slovenian Society Informatika - Section for Operational Research;Croatian Operational Research Society, vol. 28(2), pages 441-459, June.
    11. Kirshner, Samuel N. & Shao, Lusheng, 2018. "Internal and external reference effects in a two-tier supply chain," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 267(3), pages 944-957.
    12. Zhang, Jie & Chiang, Wei-yu Kevin, 2020. "Durable goods pricing with reference price effects," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    13. Georgia Perakis & Melvyn Sim & Qinshen Tang & Peng Xiong, 2023. "Robust Pricing and Production with Information Partitioning and Adaptation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(3), pages 1398-1419, March.
    14. Xin Chen & Peng Hu & Stephen Shum & Yuhan Zhang, 2016. "Dynamic Stochastic Inventory Management with Reference Price Effects," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 64(6), pages 1529-1536, December.
    15. Anton, Ramona & Chenavaz, Régis Y. & Paraschiv, Corina, 2023. "Dynamic pricing, reference price, and price-quality relationship," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    16. Hsieh, Tsu-Pang & Dye, Chung-Yuan, 2017. "Optimal dynamic pricing for deteriorating items with reference price effects when inventories stimulate demand," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 262(1), pages 136-150.

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