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Professor Richard Timberlake (1984) recently suggested that the Federal Reserve System (Fed) was made unnecessary by the clearinghouse loan certificate (CLOC). This paper presents evidence that the Fed was rendered unnecessary by Aldrich‐Vreeland Act Currency (AVAC).

This paper traces the evolution of objective measurement of textile hand and comfort from Pierce through modern methodology and approaches. Special emphasis is given to discuss the contribution of the Kawabata Evaluation System (KES) towards advancing the state of objective measurement. Laboratory case studies are used to show how data generated by the KES and other instruments can be integrated into a comprehensive approach that attempts to explain human comfort response to garment wear in terms of fabric mechanical, surface and heat and moisture transfer properties.

An organization’s entrepreneurial orientation will relate directly to its efficiency strategies, market development strategies (growth), and its product development strategies (innovation). A firm will develop appropriate strategic control systems according to these chosen strategies. In order to be competitive and balance efficiency, growth and innovation strategies, the purpose of this paper is to discuss the most appropriate strategic controls to implement these strategies.

The eight variables under study were measured using 22 psychometric survey items obtained from responses of 101 FDIC-registered banks.

The results show a more entrepreneurial orientation is associated with an efficiency strategy, a market development strategy, and a product development strategy. The efficiency strategy was not associated with formal controls, contrary to expectations. A market development strategy was associated with formal rules, but was not found to be associated with formal targets. Finally, product development strategies was associated with all four strategic control archetypes.

The limitation of this study is that, it only examined banking institutions, and did not consider long-term financial performance implications. This paper supports and extends current research pertaining to company key success factors. Success requires effectively balancing cost reduction objectives, growth objectives, and innovation objectives, in order to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. A more entrepreneurial orientation necessitates a focus on innovation, traditional growth patterns, as well as cost cutting.

This paper demonstrates that an organization’s entrepreneurial orientation will relate directly to its efficiency, growth, and innovation strategies. Also, it finds the most effective strategic controls to implement these strategies.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of socio-economic context in affecting the relationship between personal values and the purchase of fair trade (FT) products.

The study was based on data and information collected by means of a web-administered survey and was performed in two steps. First, an explanatory factor analysis on the Schwartz value system and a confirmatory factor analysis on socio-economic context variables were carried out. Second, the per capita GDP at provincial level and the predicted factor scores were used in an ordered probit model to explain the expenditure level of FT products.

The results provide evidence that the value system has an effect on the consumption of FT products, but the economic context, in particular the average wealth at province level, is also relevant and plays a role by either affecting FT product purchasing levels directly or interacting with personal values.

Because of the electronic submission and the specific channel used in the survey, the sample cannot be considered as representative of Italian consumers, and thus the analysis has a merely descriptive (non-inferential) function.

While several studies investigated how personal values affect consumers’ behaviour directly or indirectly, very few studies analysed the way socio-economic context interacts with the value structure and the way both aspects influence ethical consumption. The present study analyses this last aspect and provides evidence of the role economic context plays in affecting the relationship between personal values and FT products consumption.

In this paper the competitive landscape of financial institutions is shifting and internet banking is no longer a competitive advantage but a competitive necessity for banks. However, a limited number of empirical studies have been published in the marketing literature about electronic banking. This paper seeks to examine consumers' choices between electronic banking and non‐electronic banking in New Zealand.

The paper shows that the data for this analysis were obtained through a mail survey sent to 1,960 households in New Zealand. The decision to use electronic banking is hypothesised to be a function of service quality dimensions, perceived risk factors, user input factors, price factors, service product characteristics, individual factors and demographic variables such as age, gender, marital status, income, etc. Logistic regression is used to analyse the data. The discrete dependent variable measures whether an individual is an electronic banking or non‐electronic banking user.

The findings in the paper show that the output from the logistic regression indicates that the service quality, perceived risk factors, user input factors, employment, and education are the dominant variables that influence consumers' choice of electronic banking and non‐electronic banking channels.

This paper provides an improved understanding of consumers' choice between electronic and non‐electronic banking. This paper also identifies new relationships, and provides findings that further support, confirm, or contradict previous studies. In addition, it provides insights into the links between electronic banking and consumer decision making, to help provide strategies, recommendations and guidelines for the banking industry.

The paper shows how banks are developing, and utilizing new alternative distribution channels to reach their customers.

This study aims to explain why low social conduct in corporate social responsibility (SC-CSR), especially employee exploitation, has a stronger negative impact on consumer reactions for service firms than for manufacturing firms.

Five experiments compared consumer reactions to service and manufacturing firms with low SC-CSR. Study 1 used a choice-based conjoint design to examine the relative importance of various shared attributes when consumers chose services versus goods. Study 2 revealed that low SC-CSR led to more pronounced negative consumers reactions toward service firms. Studies 3A and 3B explained this difference through a serial mediation analysis. Study 4 ruled out an alternative explanation regarding the differentiated effects.

The results reveal that consumer reactions to employee exploitation in service firms are more negative compared to manufacturing firms. This is because consumers’ sense of presence (i.e. feeling of being there) is stronger in a service setting, leading to more intense empathetic emotions toward service employees.

This research contributes to the CSR literature by challenging the conventional notion that sweatshops are more problematic for manufacturing firms. By contrast, the results indicate a stronger negative effect on service firms. It contributes to the services marketing literature by conceptualizing a novel cognitive mechanism. Traditionally, consumers’ negative reactions are driven by anger. However, the authors show that empathetic feelings toward mistreated employees play a predominant role. While it is imperative for all firms to ensure fair treatment of their employees, the findings underscore the heightened significance of this aspect for service firms, given their susceptibility to more pronounced negative effects.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the online retail banking industry and determine if there is evidence that online banking will be a dominant player in the financial services retail marketplace.

An analysis of 22 banks is conducted and it is determined that the barriers to entry that are identified may not be enough to prohibit a substantial number of entrants into the marketplace.

Using Porter's five‐force model to conduct the industry analysis; online banking is still in its infancy, although with great potential. According to FDIC, while approximately 40 percent of the 10,623 banks and thrifts in the US market have a website, only 376 offer transactional internet banking at the time of the study. About 30 internet‐only banks or a pure‐play format operate in the USA. All of the web‐only banks in the USA combined have about 250,000 depositors, out of the nearly six million customers who have stated that they do significant banking activities over the internet.

Owing to the different types of potential suppliers, the suppliers in the online‐banking industry do not appear to have as big a bargaining power in this industry as they would in another industry. Buyers, however, hold the keys to success in the online‐banking industry. Buyers do not need the product that is offered due to the many substitute products available in the market.

In the end, the rivalries among banks lead them to differentiating their internet banking products which is what will afford one bank to have a competitive advantage over the rest of the market.

Advances in electronic banking technology have created novel ways of handling daily banking affairs, especially via the online banking channel. The acceptance of online banking services has been rapid in many parts of the world, and in the leading e‐banking countries the number of e‐banking contracts has exceeded 50 percent. Investigates online banking acceptance in the light of the traditional technology acceptance model (TAM), which is leveraged into the online environment. On the basis of a focus group interview with banking professionals, TAM literature and e‐banking studies, we develop a model indicating online‐banking acceptance among private banking customers in Finland. The model was tested with a survey sample (n=268). The findings of the study indicate that perceived usefulness and information on online banking on the Web site were the main factors influencing online‐banking acceptance.

This paper aims to highlight myriad accomplishments of C. Bertrand Thompson, who is perhaps most well known as a scientific-management bibliographer and a Taylor disciple, in the belief that his contributions as a pioneer management theorist and consultant in Europe deserve to be more widely known and more deeply appreciated.

Archival, primary and secondary sources were used in the research.

Thompson was among the first to bring management consulting to Europe. He understood the importance of adapting scientific-management principles to meet the diverse needs of each client for whom he consulted. Thompson’s strong belief and value system remained constant throughout his life.

Understanding the needs of customers or clients and adapting systems to meet those needs is essential in achieving success as a consultant.

By drawing on rarely accessed published and unpublished materials, this paper discusses Thompson’s many contributions to management thought and practice, most of which previously have not been highlighted in the referent literature.

Two hot topics today in the popular press as well as academic literature are international entrepreneurship and corporate entrepreneurship. These topics challenge two traditional notions within those fields: the difficulty of established corporations to be entrepreneurial and the difficulty of entrepreneurs to go global. The current study introduces the concept global corporate ventures, which merges the concepts internal corporate ventures and “born globals.” This concept is developed and illustrated by two examples of global corporate ventures, ING Direct and HSBC Direct, two financial services e‐commerce ventures that have been launched on a global scale.