Do store flyers trigger cross-category sales? The moderating role of categories’ relatedness
(R2020-83124)

AUTHORS

Saeid Vafainia, ESCP EUROPE; Els Breugelmans, KU Leuven; Tammo Bijmolt, University of Groningen

KEYWORDS

Store flyer effectiveness; Category relatedness; Cross-sales effect

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the impact of featuring product categories in a store flyer on crosscategory sales and explores how this effect is moderated by the degree of relatedness between the featured categories and other categories. The authors analyze the cross-sales effects of eight departments and 45 categories for a durable goods retailer in The Netherlands over 52 weeks. The empirical results indicate that there is an overall negative cross-sales flyer effect at the department level, while the effect at the category level is non-significant. Yet, this crosscategory sales effect of the store flyer varies substantially across several category relatedness constructs. More specifically, the degree of complementarity between categories, the similarity between categories in terms of the degree of hedonism and the distance between categories in the store have a significant positive impact on the cross-category sales flyer effect.