Project 1: Managers’ behavior during price-setting processes with a focus on heuristics in information analysis.
Pricing research often focuses on the application and impact of pricing methods or pricing strategies. Far less attention is paid to decision processes, the preparation of pricing decisions, such as information analysis, and the organization of pricing units. Yet, in real-world pricing situations, these tasks are crucial to unfold a product’s price potential, especially for B2B companies. Therefore, in our research we pose the following questions:
- How do pricing managers deal with uncertainty and information scarcity?
- Which heuristics are used in pricing? And which impact do they have on price success?
- What do pricing processes look like in reality? And how do existing models have to be adapted to reflect management reality?
- What effects do different heuristics and approaches have on active price management and firm performance?
Project 2: Prices at international art auctions: a conceptual framework for the auction price mechanism.
The auction price mechanism serves to identify and maximize individual willingness to pay. Therefore, the auction is particularly suitable for price discovery in the international art market, where prices depend substantially on – strongly varying and often irrational – individual willingness to pay. Due to regular record prices and at the latest since the establishment of art as an investment, the scientific, as well as the public debate about art, revolves around prices. But how do prices actually arise at international art auctions? And what role does marketing play? In our project, we address the following key questions:
- How do hammer prices arise at international art auctions? How can the price mechanism be characterized?
- Which quantifiable and difficult-to-quantify factors influence the price mechanism?
- Which actors, institutions, objects and interactions contribute to the price formation?
- What role does marketing play in art auction prices? What influence does it have? Where are the limits?
