Smith Business Close-Up: Summer Drought Leads to Fall Price Hikes

August 30, 2012 & September 2, 2012

The summer of 2012 saw record droughts in much of United States, particularly the Midwest, impacting the growing season for the nation’s farmers. With entire crops lost, many of the effects are yet to be seen on the grocery shelves.

In this edition of Smith Business Close-Up with the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, Jie Zhang talks about what consumers can expect and how retailers and marketers might react.

Zhang is an associate professor of marketing and the Harvey Sanders Fellow of Retail Management at the Smith School. Her research applies econometric and statistical models to study consumers’ purchase behavior and responses to various promotion programs, and then she designs innovative decision support tools for marketers based on these models. Zhang teaches retail management and has published research in marketing and management journals such as Marketing Science, the Journal of Marketing Research, and Management Science.