Over 40% of nursing home residents in the Netherlands are estimated to have visual impairments. In this study, light conditions in Dutch nursing homes were assessed in terms of horizontal and vertical illuminances and colour temperature. Results showed that in the seven nursing homes vertical illuminances in common rooms fell significantly below the 750 lx reference value in at least 65% of the measurements. Horizontal illuminance measurements in common rooms showed a similar pattern. At least 55% of the measurements were below the 750 lx threshold. The number of measurements at the window zone was significantly higher than the threshold level of 750 lx. Illuminances in the corridors fell significantly below the 200 lx threshold in at least three quarters of the measurements in six of the seven nursing homes. The colour temperature of light fell significantly below the reference value for daylight of 5000 K with median scores of 3400 to 4500 K. A significant difference in colour temperature was found between recently constructed nursing homes and some older homes. Lighting conditions of the examined nursing homes were poor. With these data, nursing home staff have the means to improve the lighting conditions, for instance, by encouraging residents to be seated next to a window when performing a task or during meals.
Brand portfolio strategies are an essential prerequisite for securing long-term success for multi-brand companies. Only by focusing on the entire portfolio can it be ensured that all brands “act in concert” to achieve superordinate objectives. Thereby, an increasing vertical competition caused by private labels calls for a new approach, by which brand manufacturers integrate private labels into their portfolio management. This paper presents a planning model that is embedded in the company’s strategic management and demonstrates how brand-related objectives/strategies can be linked with superordinated objectives/strategies. By including vertical marketing goals into portfolio strategy, brand manufacturers may gain from extending the planning scope to private label brands.
MULTIFILE
The academic and professional attention to the large synergies hidden in horizontal collaborations is increasing. This study attempts to address the impact of collaborative transport on transportation lead-time and lead-time variability through empirically investigating a group of SMEs involved in a collaborative distribution network. Data was collected for seven pre-cooperation and eight cooperative orders over a period of 14 months. The results of Mann-Whitney U-test show a significant average reduction of 30.8% in the duration of lead times. Lead-time variability was also found to be reduced as the result of changes in the coefficient of variances and the Bartlett’s test for homogeneity of variances. Horizontal collaboration in transport could eventually lead to reduced lead times and lower variability of lead time which results in reduced supply chain costs. This can be achieved by means of direct routing and avoiding multi-transshipment routes which reduces the uncertainty and variability by diminishing the number of stages in the transport chain. Thus, effective lead-time management is considered a source of competitive advantage as it can reduce supply chain costs by lowering inventory levels, but is also capable of improving performance and customer service by offering improved product quality service levels.
Denim Democracy from the Alliance for Responsible Denim (ARD) is an interactive exhibition that celebrates the journey and learning of ARD members, educates visitors about sustainable denim and highlights how companies collaborate together to achieve results. Through sight, sound and tactile sensations, the visitor experiences and fully engages sustainable denim production. The exhibition launches in October 2018 in Amsterdam and travels to key venues and locations in the Netherlands until April 2019. As consumers, we love denim but the denim industry, like other sub-sectors in the textile, apparel and footwear industries, faces many complex sustainability challenges and has been criticized for its polluting and hazardous production practices. The Alliance for Responsible Denim project brought leading denim brands, suppliers and stakeholders together to collectively address these issues and take initial steps towards improving the ecological sustainability impact of denim production. Sustainability challenges are considered very complex and economically undesirable for individual companies to address alone. In denim, small and medium sized denim firms face specific challenges, such as lower economies of scale and lower buying power to affect change in practices. There is great benefit in combining denim companies' resources and knowledge so that collective experimentation and learning can lift the sustainability standards of the industry and lead to the development of common standards and benchmarks on a scale that matters. If meaningful, transformative industrial change is to be made, then it calls for collaboration between denim industry stakeholders that goes beyond supplier-buyer relations and includes horizontal value chain collaboration of competing large and small denim brands. However collaboration between organizations, and especially between competitors, is highly complex and prone to failure. The research behind the Alliance for Responsible Denim project asked a central research question: how do competitors effectively collaborate together to create common, industry standards on resource use and benchmarks for improved ecological sustainability? To answer this question, we used a mixed-method, action research approach. The Alliance for Responsible Denim project mobilized and facilitated denim brands to collectively identify ways to reduce the use of water and chemicals in denim production and then aided them to implement these practices individually in their respective firms.
