Spatial dynamics of retail structure and the venerable retail hierarchy

The retail system is continuously adapting itself to changing demographic conditions, consumer behavior and economic conditions. Existing retail units, getting larger in order to achieve economics of scale, and new forms of large-scale retailing do not fit easily in the traditional spatial pattern of retail concentrations. Neverteless the spatial distribution of retailing in urban areas, as schematized by Berry thirty-five years ago, still has its value. Through an upward hierarchical movement the retail system has adapted itself to an inflexible spatial system, in which downtown has still a dominant position. Future developments, however, may weaken the position of central shopping areas in favour of peripheral locations. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

In poor health: Supermarket redlining and urban nutrition

Over the past 100 years, ethnic minorities and the poor have become increasingly concentrated and isolated in low-income urban neighborhoods. While the demographic changes in cities are well documented, the parallel history of urban retailing is less well known. Little research has been done on changes in urban food retailing, particularly as they concern the urban poor. As the residential character of urban neighborhoods changed during the 20th century, so did the amenities available in those neighborhoods. The low point for urban retailing was in the 1980s, when cities experienced a net loss of supermarkets even as, nationally, store openings exceeded closings. The trend toward fewer, bigger stores located outside cities has continued to the present. Some critics have referred to this disinclination of large chains to locate in cities as `supermarket redlining'. Changes in food availability are a key element in the changing social conditions of the urban poor and, as good nutrition is critical for good health, a contributing factor in the decline of urban health. This paper will examine changes in urban retail food availability, the impact these changes have had on the health status of the urban poor, strategies utilized by the urban poor to address inadequate access to quality food sources, and the role of supermarkets in distressed communities.     

Globalizing retail and the ‘new e-conomy’: The organizational challenge of e-commerce for the retail TNCs

This paper examines the organizational challenge of e-commerce for emerging retail transnational corporations (TNCs). The paper begins by scoping and conceptualizing the retail TNCs and in the process, draws attention to the high level of territorial embeddedness of these firms. This provides the framework for the remainder of the paper, where the organizational challenge of a ‘multi-channel’ paradigm (blending online and offline forms of retail distribution) is evaluated. Specifically, the paper argues that place, space and embeddedness continue to matter in the ‘new e-conomy’ of multi-channel distribution.     

Kyanite-andalusite equilibrium

The solubilities of macrocrystalline andalusite and kyanite have been measured in water between 400 and 550 °C and at pressures of 1–3 kilobars. Resulting data indicate that the phases are in equilibrium at 398 °C (1 kb,), 472 °C (2 kb) and 534 °C (3 kb). Due to the inherent difficulty of measuring small solubility differences errors in these temperatures could be as much as ±40 °C although experimental reproducibility suggests greater precision.     

Stilbite-laumontite equilibrium

The reaction stilbite=laumontite+3 quartz+3 H₂O was experimentally studied using conventional hydrothermal techniques employing mineral mixtures consisting of reactants and products in 91 and 19 ratios. Equilibrium was demonstrated; the univariant curve passes through about 170° C and 2000 bars, 185°±10° C and 3000 bars, about 185° C and 4000 bars, and 183°±10° C at 5000 bars P _fluid. These results combined with published equilibria for analcime, laumontite, wairakite and prehnite permit delineation of the P-T conditions for the zeolite and prehnite-pumpellyite facies metamorphism in the Tanzawa Mountains, Japan.     

Olivine-liquid equilibrium

A number of experiments have been conducted in order to study the equilibria between olivine and basaltic liquids and to try and understand the conditions under which olivine will crystallize. These experiments were conducted with several basaltic compositions over a range of temperature (1150–1300° C) and oxygen fugacity (10^?0.68–10^?12 atm.) at one atmosphere total pressure. The phases in these experimental runs were analyzed with the electron microprobe and a number of empirical equations relating the composition of olivine and liquid were determined. The distribution coefficient 1 $$K_D = \frac{{(X_{{\text{FeO}}}^{{\text{Ol}}} )}}{{(X_{{\text{FeO}}}^{{\text{Liq}}} )}}\frac{{(X_{{\text{MgO}}}^{{\text{Liq}}} )}}{{(X_{{\text{MgO}}}^{{\text{Ol}}} )}}$$ relating the partioning of iron and magnesium between olivine and liquid is equal to 0.30 and is independent of temperature. This means that the composition of olivine can be used to determine the magnesium to ferrous iron ratio of the liquid from which it crystallized and conversely to predict the olivine composition which would crystallize from a liquid having a particular magnesium to ferrous iron ratio. A model (saturation surface) is presented which can be used to estimate the effective solubility of olivine in basaltic melts as a function of temperature. This model is useful in predicting the temperature at which olivine and a liquid of a particular composition can coexist at equilibrium.     

The organisational context of retail locational planning

Retailers have a large number of techniques at their disposal to assist them in their locational planning, but the use made of them is varied, regardless of their intrinsic merits. The reasons for this lie very much in the organisational context in which the techniques are applied. This paper discusses the nature of locational planning and decision making, and puts forward a framework which links locational planning and the organisational settings in which it takes place. The preliminary results of a survey of the use of techniques by U.K. retailers are presented, which show that while most companies use more than ‘Rules of Thumb’, it is the simplest techniques which are the most widely used. The application of the more advanced knowledge based methods is still relatively uncommon. The explanation for the variations lies in the attributes of the techniques themselves, the types of locational planning undertaken, and the structural and cultural characteristics of the companies. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

赵如龙:开拓市场加强与国际接轨

当前，我国正朝着知识化、信息化社会迈进，同时，经济全球化趋势的加速以及我国加入WTO过渡期的结束，使工程咨询和勘察设计行业面临的市场环境、人才环境、政策环境都发生了深刎的变化。由此，工程咨询和勘察设计市场结构和市场竞争方式将发生变化，过去的市场竞争目标趋同、同一市场过度竞争的情况逐步打破，多领域、多层次的市场结构和在多领域、不同层次市场卜技术能力与特色竞争的格局逐步形成。     

Methodological problems of intercultural comparisons of retail environments

The internationalising activities of retailers have tended to precede the theoretical contributions of academics. This is particularly the case for the cultural context within which retail internationalisation takes place. Following an examination of the growth of international retailing activity, the article reviews generic difficulties in studying inter-cultural differences before considering the specific steps which retail practitioners have taken to understand the comparative characteristics of retail and consumer markets through the growth of geodemographic and lifestyle analysis. Finally, we relate one of the most significant integrative intercultural theoretical instruments to the case of retail internationalisation within Western Europe. We find that significant insights into retailer behaviour and strategy can be gained from an understanding of the culturally-specific characteristics of the activity. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Pressure and equilibrium in deforming rocks

It is widely proposed that tectonic pressure (the difference between the mean stress and the pressure arising from a lithostatic load) is large, and has a significant influence on mineral phase equilibria in deforming metamorphic rocks. The implication/assertion is that the mean stress is equivalent to the thermodynamic pressure which characterizes mineral phase equilibria and is a measure of how the energy changes as the volume changes. We distinguish two useful thermodynamic pressures. The first is an equilibrium thermodynamic pressure, characteristic of non‐dissipative systems and related directly to equilibrium values of the chemical potentials that define stable, equilibrium phase assemblages. The second is a non‐equilibrium thermodynamic pressure characteristic of dissipative systems with zero net entropy production and related to non‐equilibrium chemical potentials that define stable non‐equilibrium phase assemblages. In many dissipative metamorphic systems discussed in the literature, the concepts of thermodynamic pressure and chemical potential are not usefully defined because the system is not at equilibrium and/or no volume change is involved in the deformation. The conclusion of this note is that the influence of tectonic pressure on phase equilibria is minor. The role of tectonic pressure is an important issue but is only relevant to phase equilibrium when an equilibrium thermodynamic pressure can be defined; in such cases, the influence of tectonic pressure is small compared to many proposals in the literature. Except for elastic deformations, the mean stress is not useful in discussing mineral phase equilibrium.     

Constructing environmental responsibility: Perceptions from retail business

This paper examines how retail businesses have employed the concept of environmental responsibility in order to justify their activities in the environmental arena. The sources of such publicised responsibility are investigated in terms of the relationship between the business and the consumer and how far responsibility has a moral base within the company or an economic justification with respect to demand. Data come from in-depth interviews with national and local managers of large multiple grocery superstores in the U.K. as well as from material published by these companies both through leafletting and more standardised reporting channels. Emphasis is placed upon the contradictions between the declaration of internally derived responsibility and the external pressures of demand, legislation and public image, suggesting an anticipatory form of environmental responsibility has been developed by retailers and that this may produce more proactive measures as the environmental debate matures.     

Classifications of retail stores and shopping centres: some methodological issues

This paper reviews current methods used in classifying retail outlets and areas devoted to retailing, in the geographical and town planning literature. For retail outlets, classifications based upon types of goods sold, and types of shopping trip, are discussed. This is followed by an analysis of modern large store development which reflects property developers' and retailers' concerns. Areas devoted to retail uses are subdivided into unplanned ‘retail areas’ and planned ‘shopping centres’. Traditional classifications based upon central place theory are reviewed for both of these types, and found wanting in the light of recent changes in retail development practice and consumer behaviour. Classifications based upon physical development characteristics and type of shopping trip are recommended. Finally, classifications of urban retail location are examined. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Changing methods of location planning for retail companies

Academic research has made an enormous contribution to applied problem solving in the areas of retail planning and marketing. The aim of this paper is to review the changing methodologies used in store location research beginning with the work on simple checklist and analogue techniques in the 1960s. The arrival of geographical information systems (GIS) heralded the start of a second phase of work which eventually saw GIS established in many retail organisations. However, the main argument of this paper is the need to consider more sophisticated modelling procedures if the different types of corporate growth strategy are to be adequately investigated. This third phase of research development focuses on these models and illustrates the business potential of such approaches through a number of case studies. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Open innovation and its discontents

This paper critically synthesizes empirics and issues in discrete inter-disciplinary literatures to identify ‘open innovation’ as part of an emergent regime of accumulation, overlaying and co-existing with flexible production, and encompassing novel firm-level strategies, new forms of corporate networks, and a disturbing capital-labor relation that informalizes innovative work while cultivating entrepreneurial but self-exploiting subjects. I explain the novelty of open innovation, its genealogy, and the implications for people and conditions of work as much as for firms in a new topology of power relations. I cast the ensemble of strategies and tactics encompassed in open innovation as contingent, continually unfolding, and sometimes chaotic if not destructive for both firms and labor, in contrast to the celebratory tone in the business as well as geography and regional studies literatures regarding its benefits for competitiveness, innovativeness, value capture, and development. Open innovation – the externalization of innovation – entails long-run approaches to innovation and investment that are fraught with problems, prompting the development of short-term tactics to engage the challenges. One short-run strategy, crowdsourcing, bypasses the conventional web of inter-firm relations to connect digitally with individuals of the global crowd, enabling firms to reap the benefits of the crowd’s innovative talents, often without remuneration under circumstances that institutionalize informal work. These neoliberal subjects are best understood in terms of multiple subjectivities. I close by connecting the crowdsourcing of innovative with non-innovative work, both of which are parts of the emergent regime associated with new hiring and work practices that usher in new modes of exploitation.     

Garnet + liquid equilibrium

New experiments were performed to determine saturation conditions for garnet and silicate liquid. Starting compositions were natural basalt powders ranging from komatiite to nephelinite, which were partially melted at pressures between 25 and 100 kbar. Rounded grains of natural pyrope or grossular were added to some experiments to induce garnet saturation, and to aid the segregation of liquid pools for microprobe analysis. Simple expressions describing K _eq as a function of P, T and liquid composition were calibrated by linear least squares analysis of the data from this, and other, studies. Since garnets do not often occur as phenocrysts, equations were designed to predict garnet compositions when P, T and a silicate liquid composition are given. The regression data have a pressure range of 20–270 kbar, and compositions as diverse as nephelinite and komatiite. These models should thus apply to a broad range of geological problems. The majorite component in garnet was found to increase with increasing P, but compositional effects are also important. A garnet saturation surface applied to liquids with chondritic compositions shows that such liquids crystallize garnet with Mj contents of 0.27–0.42 at 200 kbar. Models of Earth differentiation thus need to account not only for fractionation of majorite, but also for Fe-, Ca-, Na- and Ti-bearing garnet components, which occur in non-trivial quantities at high pressure. Since many models of igneous petrogenesis rely on mineral-melt partition coefficients for the minor elements Na, Ti, and Cr, partition coefficients for these elements were also examined. The K _d ^gar/liq for Na was found to be P-sensitive; Na contents of basalts may thus potentially yield information regarding depths of partial melting. Received : 28 May 1997 / 25 November 1997     

Institutional forces and retail change: a case study of Metropolitan Toronto

There is a growing interest in the development of purpose-built shopping centres, which now dominate the retail environments of many cities. Much of the past research has been directed at the impact of shopping centres on more traditional retail structures. More recently, however, there has been a recognition of the importance of those institutional forces that shape the internal character of shopping centres and ultimately determine their economic impact. This paper draws attention to these factors and discusses the control that leasing agreements and corporate policy have on shopping centre development. The whole discussion is set within the framework of metropolitan Toronto, which has for some time experienced the full impact of these institutional forces.     

Geochemical and equilibrium trends in mine pit lakes

Chemical composition and equilibrium trends in mine pit lakes were examined to provide guidance for the application of geochemical models in predicting future lake water quality at prospective open pit mines. Composition trends show that elevated solute levels generally occur only at the extremes of acidic and alkaline pH conditions. Concentrations of cationic metals (Al, Cd, Cu, Fe, Mn, Pb, and Zn) are elevated only in acidic pit lakes, whereas anionic metalloids (As and Se) are generally elevated only in alkaline pit lakes. These trends are indicative of sulfide mineral oxidation and evapoconcentration for acidic and alkaline conditions, respectively.For nearly all pit lakes, SO₄ is the dominant solute, but is limited by gypsum solubility. Fluorite, calcite, and barite are also important solubility controls. Well-defined solubility controls exist for the major metals (Al, Fe, Mn), including jurbanite and alunite for Al, ferrihydrite for Fe, and manganite, birnessite, and, possibly, rhodochrosite for Mn. Determinations of definite controls for the minor metals are less distinct, but may include otavite for Cd, brochantite and malachite for Cu, cerrusite and pyromorphite for Pb, and hydrozincite and Zn silicates for Zn. Concentrations of As and Se appear to be limited only by adsorption, but this control is sharply diminished by increased pH and SO₄ concentration. In general, the concentrations of minor metals in pit lakes are not well represented by the theoretical solubilities of pure-phase minerals contained in the thermodynamic databases. Hence, modeling efforts will generally have to rely on empirical data on the leaching characteristics of pit wall-rocks to predict the concentrations of minor metals (Cd, Cu, Pb, Zn) in mine pit lakes.Methodologies for predicting pit lake water chemistry are still evolving. Geochemical and equilibrium trends in existing pit lakes can provide valuable information for guiding the development and application of predictive models. However, mineralogical studies of pit lake sediments, suspended particles, and alteration assemblages and studies of redox transformations are still needed to validate and refine the representations of geochemical processes in water quality models of mine pit lakes.