Store brand entry with asymmetric cost information

Abstract

This study conducts research on a dominant retailer’s establishment strategy of a store brand in a supply chain, in which the retailer possesses private knowledge of the store brand’s product cost, while the manufacturer is only informed about the distribution of this cost information. The store brand entry with asymmetric information initiates a signaling game between the chain members. Through comparing equilibrium outcomes, we find that the pooling equilibrium consistently prevails as the dominant equilibrium, suggesting that the informed retailer is reluctant to reveal the cost information to her national brand cooperative manufacturer. We also explore the influence of a retailer’s store brand entry on the national-brand manufacturer’s performance. The findings reveal that, with asymmetric cost information, mutually beneficial outcomes for all parties involved can be achieved by the establishment of a store brand. Furthermore, we delve into how the asymmetric cost information affects the performance of the chain members. Surprisingly, our findings demonstrate that asymmetric cost information may be desirable not only for the retailer, but also for the less informed manufacturer under specific circumstances. This suggests the possibility of supply chain members reaching a mutual agreement on the structure of asymmetric cost information.