The Pricing and Carbon Abatement Decisions of a Manufacturer Selling with Marketplace or Reselling Mode

AbstractIn this paper, we study the pricing and carbon abatement decisions of a manufacturer who sells products to consumers with environmental awareness through an online platform and an offline channel. The platform operates with marketplace or reselling mode. Cross‐channel spillover effect (CSE) is taken into account to reflect the impact of online channel sales on offline channel sales. With marketplace mode, the manufacturer directly sells its products to consumers on the platform, paying a commission to the platform for each order. With reselling mode, the manufacturer wholesales products to the platform, who then retails them to consumers. We find that the increase in the cross‐channel effect can positively affect the carbon abatement level, the production quantity and the profits of the manufacturer and platform. Marketplace (reselling) mode provides the manufacturer with more profits than reselling (marketplace) mode and induces the manufacturer to adopt greener technology if the CSE is high (low). Marketplace mode cannot coordinate the manufacturer and platform, while reselling mode can if the CSE is negative. We also extend the models to the case under omnichannel strategy and find that omnichannel strategy leads to higher carbon abatement level and brings more profit to the manufacturer under certain conditions. In addition, marketplace mode cannot coordinate the manufacturer and platform, while reselling mode always can. The findings in this paper not only enrich the theoretical research in platform‐based and low‐carbon operations management but also guide the management practice in these aspects.