مدیریت سهم مشتری در ارتباط با تأمین کنندگان کلیدی

Supply base consolidation is an important issue in many business markets. Against this background, the allocation of purchasing budgets across vendors becomes an area of vital interest to suppliers. In the present research, we argue that customer share is a key decision variable in business marketing settings and investigate how a supplier can proactively manage the share of its customer's business. We report the results of a cross-sectional study among purchasing managers in U.S. manufacturing industries. Our findings confirm the role of customer value as an antecedent to customer share in business relationships. The study further shows that customer share influences the stability of key supplier relationships. Rather than displaying a direct impact, our results suggest that trust mediates and dependence moderates the link between customer share and search for alternative suppliers. Based on these findings, we propose a framework for managing customer share in key supplier relationships. Four approaches of how industrial vendors can proactively manage customer share are discussed.

Over the last decades, supply base consolidation has been a major issue in business marketing and supply chain management (e.g., Hunt & Morgan, 1994, Kulp et al., 2004, Ogden, 2006 and Sarkar & Mohapatra, 2006). Sheth and Sharma (1997) observe a widespread trend towards downsizing of the supplier portfolio between 20 and 90%. Cousins (1999) reports typical supply base rationalizations in the region of 40 to 70%. As a current example, take the European aerospace industry. In 2007, Airbus Industries announced ‘Power8’, a major restructuring program intended to achieve savings of 750 million Euros annually. Among other measures, the group planned to reduce the number of its first-tier suppliers from 3000 to 500 (Airbus, 2007). Similarly, THALES, a major European supplier to the aerospace industry, reduced the number of its key suppliers from 3000 in 2004 to 1100 in 2007. The ultimate goal of such moves is to gain competitive advantage (Cousins, 1999). Through cost reductions and quality improvements, a firm's supply chain may indeed become one of the strongest barriers of entry for competitors (Choi & Hartley, 1996). The advantages of working with fewer suppliers are well documented in the purchasing and supply chain management literature (Chen & Paulraj, 2004, Hahn et al., 1986 and Kekre et al., 1995). From a cost perspective, placing a greater emphasis on fewer suppliers allows a customer to concentrate order volumes and gain more influence over vendors. Beyond price concessions, a focus on selected suppliers allows a firm to reduce total cost of ownership. For example, through better coordination and exchange of information, order processing and inventory management may be dramatically improved. Similarly, by adopting flexible manufacturing strategies and design-to-cost approaches, key suppliers can assist customers in taking additional costs out of production processes. From a quality perspective, a limited supply base allows customers to invest in supplier development. In addition to improving quality of existing products, it allows customers to motivate vendors to engage in efforts of joint product development. Scholars also recognize potential downsides of a reduced supplier base (Newman, 1989, Talluri & Narasimhan, 2005 and Trevelen & Bergman Schweikhart, 1988). Above all, buyers face increased dependence and, consequently, higher risks of supply disruption. In addition, suppliers may be tempted to raise prices to take advantage of a customer's increased level of dependence. Finally, favoring one supplier over others typically comes at the cost of reduced flexibility. For example, in industries where technology changes are frequent, the commitment to a particular supplier typically results in locking customers in on a specific technology. Along with the trend towards supply base reduction, the purchasing and supply chain management literature discusses how this trend affects sourcing strategies at the individual firm level. Indeed, many industrial customers progressively modify their purchasing policies and behavior shifting from a focus on competitive multiple sourcing to more sophisticated sourcing strategies, such as cross-sourcing, dual sourcing or single sourcing (Monczka et al., 2005 and Ogden, 2006). How to allocate order volumes across selected suppliers is considered a key decision in the scholarly literature on purchasing and supply chain management. Against this background, it comes as a surprise that empirical research on investigating customer share in business markets is still in its infancy (Anderson & Narus, 2003 and Leuthesser & Kohli, 1995). Therefore, we contend that there is a fundamental need to better understand the role of customer share in organizational buying behavior.2 As a marketing metric of growing importance, customer share indicates the percentage of a customer's purchasing budget allocated to a particular vendor within a specific product category. In prior research, business marketing scholars typically included customer share as a measure of behavioral loyalty. In contrast, our study takes a different stance: rather than viewing customer share as an outcome of organizational buying behavior, the present research investigates the allocation of a purchasing budget among competing vendors as a key decision variable. Mirroring the discussion of customer share in the purchasing and supply chain management literature, we suggest that customer share should be researched as a focal construct by linking it to its antecedent, outcome, mediator, and moderator variables. Existing studies in business marketing have focused on the drivers of customer share. From both an academic and a managerial perspective, however, we also need a thorough understanding of the consequences and contingencies of customer share marketing. For example, how does holding a specific customer share in a buyer–seller relationship impact the vendor's marketing policy? How can a key supplier maintain or grow its existing business when already holding a significant share of a customer's order volumes? Under which conditions does it make most sense to increase the share of customer and when does it appear to be a problematic endeavor? To address these issues, the present article is structured as follows. We first present a comprehensive review of empirical research on customer share. Next, we develop our conceptual model. We then present our cross-sectional research design and discuss our study's findings and implications. Finally, we conclude by presenting limitations of the present research and directions for further inquiry.