Relationships between Breweries and Retailers in Cameroon

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to examine how the use of various influence strategies affect retailers’ economic and non economic satisfaction in the brewery industry in Cameroon. The Cameroon brewery industry consists of a few suppliers and a myriad of small retailers who generally deal with all the suppliers to offer a complete assortment of differentiated products to consumers. It is believed that, in such a context, retailers generally need any specific supplier more than the suppliers need any one retailer. Also, retailers may yield easily to the demands of suppliers despite any frustration that may stem from the use of coercive influence strategies that are known to have limited effects on satisfaction. Various influence strategies are considered including promises, threats, legalistic pleas, information exchanges, recommendations, and requests. We hope our ongoing empirical investigation will demonstrate that some of these influence strategies affect differently retailers’ economic and non economic satisfaction. Particularly, the impact of non coercive influence strategies will be stronger on non economic satisfaction than on economic satisfaction.