Consumer-Centric Supply Chain Management: Three Essays Addressing Active Consumer Role, Transparency and Closed-Loop Processes

The dynamic landscape of consumer behavior is pressuring companies to adapt to rapidly evolving consumer expectations and needs. The burgeoning interest in supply chain management literature toward consumer-centric research is capturing the attention of scholars and sparking diverse calls for more research. This dissertation sets forth an investigation of consumer-centric supply chain management, looking into how supply chain management activities and processes can be adapted to engage consumers as active participants. Two critical research areas emerge within the consumer-centric supply chain management literature: supply chain transparency and closed-loop supply chains. To address these topics, this dissertation employs a multi-method design approach, complementing a systematic literature review of 89 research papers from top logistics and supply chain journals with scenario-based experiments on U.S. consumer data gathered from the Prolific platform. The research is guided by signaling theory, which serves as the primary theoretical lens for hypothesis development and data analysis. The first essay systematically explores consumer-centric logistics and supply chain management literature, analyzing how the field has addressed the role of consumers. It offers a comprehensive overview of key themes, theories, and methods, identifying the diverse perspectives employed in studying consumer behavior. This essay establishes a foundation for future research and guides the development of the subsequent essays. The second essay examines the influence of supply chain transparency, particularly in recycling processes, on consumers' perceptions of product quality and purchase intentions. Surprisingly, the findings challenge existing literature and signaling theory, suggesting that merely providing information about recycling processes does not significantly affect consumer perceptions of recycled products or their purchase intentions. The third essay focuses on how transparency in closed-loop supply chains affects consumers' intentions to participate in take-back programs. The findings reveal that transparency indirectly influences participation by fostering positive attitudes toward take-back initiatives, underscoring the importance of information disclosure in encouraging consumer engagement in closed-loop practices. Overall, this dissertation provides new insights into this research field, advancing theory and practice.