Logistics Strategy and Transport Service Choices: An Adaptive Stated Preference Experiment

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper presents the results of a microanalysis of freight transport demand in a logistics context. Current research concentrates, with few exceptions, on shippers’ choice of a transport mode. However, in a global context, shippers’ behavior has to be conceived as a complex decision, which considers transport mode choice as only a part of a firm's logistics strategy. Since no data exist to directly estimate the marginal values for different qualities of transport and logistics services, a stated preference approach is applied. Adaptive stated preference experiments were performed for twenty‐two firms in Italy and in Switzerland. The experimental results—forty hypothetical binary choices per firm—were completed by background information on the firms’ long‐term logistics strategies. The results confirm the relevance of the logistics context (e.g., JIT strategies on the supplier's or customer's side) for transport demand. The calculated marginal values of time and characteristics (reliability, frequency, etc.) provide important insights and permit generalized costs in freight transport models to be recalibrated.