Hello to friends and colleagues across the country and around the world! The beginning of a new academic year is filled with energy and excitement, both for our students and our faculty. This year that momentum is augmented by a team of new faculty members who bring both extensive research accomplishments and a love of teaching to UConn.
Marketing
The Power of Empathy

When Product Developers Invoke Emotion, Do They Generate More Creative Ideas?
What kind of potato chip would you create, and what would you name it, if you wanted to sell the product exclusively to pregnant women? Continue Reading
VOYA Colloquium Asks: How is Marketing Adapting to the Digital Age?

“Marketing in the Digitalized Marketplace” was the theme of the marketing department‘s 7th VOYA Global Colloquium. The Oct. 20 event gathered marketing researchers from across the country to discuss research in the growing areas of user-generated content, social networks, new media, and digital analytics. Continue Reading
If You Slash the Price, They Will Come!

Professor Joseph Pancras Identifies Best Sale Items to Lure Customers Away From Other Grocery Stores
If you want to increase grocery store sales, offer a discount on beer. And then place a tempting display of salty snacks right next to it—at full price.
That’s some of the well-researched advice that marketing professor Joseph Pancras and his colleagues offer grocery store executives in a newly published article in the Journal of Retailing. Continue Reading
Business Law’s Stephen Park Honored with ‘Distinguished Early Career Faculty’ Award
Business Law Assistant Professor Stephen Park was awarded the Distinguished Early Career Faculty Award by the Academy of Legal Studies in Business (ALSB) at the 2017 annual conference in Savannah, Georgia in August. Continue Reading
New Business Faculty for 2017

Impressive Professors Bring Strong Credentials, Added Zeal to School of Business Ranks
An expert in terror analytics, a marketer who worked for NBC, Pepsi and Disney, and a champion of the volunteer income tax program at UConn are among the newest faculty at the School of Business. Continue Reading
Do Deep Promotional Discounts Work? New Study Sheds Light on Strategy
University of Arkansas – Many retailers employ discounts to attract customers, but it can be difficult for businesses to know what effect these discounts have on overall store performance, and few studies have analyzed store-level data to know for sure whether this strategy works.
Deep Discounts Work for Supermarkets
University at Buffalo – For grocery retailers, the tried-and-true strategy of deep discount promotions is a successful one, according to a new study from the University at Buffalo School of Management.
Puerto Rico’s Debt Dilemma and Pathways Toward Sovereign Solvency
American Business Law Journal, Vol. 54, No. 1, 2017
Puerto Rico, as a quasi-sovereign U.S. territory, is confronting a debt crisis of unparalleled legal complexity. This article analyzes the collective action problems in sovereign debt finance in the context of Puerto Rico’s quasi-sovereign debt dilemma. We examine how sovereign debtors engage with their private creditors in the absence of a formal bankruptcy regime and show how various legal incentives, imperatives, and constraints shape the degree and form of creditor engagement. Drawing on this conceptual framework, this article analyzes the role of these factors in the market-based debt restructuring by the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) and hypothesizes how these factors may influence the statutory restructuring process underway under the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act (PROMESA). Despite the idiosyncratic aspects of Puerto Rico’s debt crisis, the potential pathways for debtor-creditor cooperation in Puerto Rico provide valuable insights on the various ways that law influences debtor-creditor cooperation in sovereign debt finance beyond the enforcement of state-based public regulation and contract-based private legal commitments. Full article.
Using Proactive Legal Strategies for Corporate Environmental Sustainability
Berger-Walliser, G., Shrivastava, P., Sulkowski, A. Using Proactive Legal Strategies for Corporate Environmental Sustainability. 6 Michigan Journal of Environmental and Administrative Law, 1-36 (2016). Date Published: June 2017
We argue that proactive law can help organizations be more sustainable. Toward that end, this Article first summarizes proactive law literature as it pertains to corporate sustainability. Next, it examines a series of cases on the pivotal nexus between proactive law and corporate sustainability. It then advances novel propositions that connect proactive law to central organizational design elements. The discussion traces further implications and suggests fruitful avenues for research and ways of using proactive law for firms to become more sustainable. Full article.