How I Wrote This

A PhD student's curiosity about open innovation. That's all it took to spark a research journey into why companies like Allbirds give away their proprietary technology—and why consumers reward them for it. JMR Co-Editor Karen Winterich speaks with Martin Schreier (WU Vienna) and Darren Dahl (UBC) about their paper, "The Open Design Effect”, co-authored with Lukas Maier (WU Vienna).
The study revealed that when firms openly share internal knowledge with the outside world—what they call "inside-out" innovation—consumers perceive societal benefits and show greater willingness to pay. In the episode, you'll hear how a research stay in Vancouver brought the team together, why a Tesla example became a "lightning rod" through multiple review rounds, and the hard-won lessons about construct precision in today's publication landscape.

GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy are changing more than just waistlines—they're disrupting the grocery aisle. JMR Co-Editor Brett Gordon speaks with Sylvia Hristakeva (Cornell), Jura Liaukonyte (Cornell), and Leo Feller (Numerator) about their paper, "The No Hunger Games: How GLP-1 Medication Adoption is Changing Consumer Food Demand.” The study linked GLP-1 usage survey data to 150,000 households' purchase data, finding that grocery spending declines by approximately 5% within six months, concentrated in processed, calorie-dense categories. Spending reverts to pre-adoption levels upon stopping the medication. In the episode, you’ll hear how quickly the project came together and the challenges of working on such a high-profile topic.

Paper on SSRN: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5073929
Paper at JMR: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00222437251412834

Questions about using AI responsibly in your research or checking ‘Yes’ to AI use in the submission process? This special episode has JMR Editor in Chief, Rebecca Hamilton, and co-editors Kapil Tuli and Raghu Iyengar joining co-hosts Brett Gordon and Karen Winterich to discuss the role of AI in authorship and the editorial process.

A single demographic statistic about car leasing. That's all it took to spark a fascinating research journey into how the perceived stability of our romantic relationships shape the products we choose to rent versus own. In this episode, Yuechen Wu  joins JMR Co-Editor Karen Winterich to reveal the story behind "Who Will I Be Without You? Consequences of Perceived Romantic Relationship Status Stability on Product Rentals." From that initial nugget of curiosity to navigating the challenges of the review process, Yuechen and co-authors Jared Watson and Ali Faraji-Rad share how persistence—and friendship—can transform a curious observation into groundbreaking consumer research.

To figure out how much a company is worth, start with its customers. This episode explores customer-based corporate valuation and how individual buying behavior ultimately drives firm value. Join JMR Co-Editor Brett Gordon as he speaks with Dan McCarthy (University of Maryland) and Peter Fader (University of Pennsylvania) about their paper, “Customer-Based Corporate Valuation for Publicly Traded Noncontractual Firms,” and how they used publicly disclosed customer metrics to value companies like Wayfair—work that even caught the attention of Wall Street.