https://www.sciencedirect.com/special-issue/318842/special-issue-si-on-sustainable-and-resilient-retail-supply-chains-addressing-current-and-future-challenges-in-modern-retailing
Guest editors:
Manuel Ostermeier
University of AugsburgProfessorship of Resilient Operations
Universitaetsstraße 12
86159 Augsburg, Germany
E-mail: manuel.ostermeier@uni-a.de
Heinrich Kuhn
Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt
Department of Operations and Supply Chain Management
Auf der Schanz 49
85049 Ingolstadt, Germany
E-mail: heinrich.kuhn@ku.de
Pedro Sanches Amorim
University of PortoDepartment of Industrial Engineering and Management
s/n, R. Dr. Roberto Frias
4200-465 Porto, Portugal
E-mail: amorim.pedro@fe.up.pt
Special issue information:
1. Aims and Scope of the SI
Retail supply chains are the key to ensuring efficiency, customer satisfaction, and long-term success in an increasingly globalized and dynamic market environment. The pivotal role of the retail industry in our daily lives and societal trends is reflected by the importance of the retail sector for any economy. For instance, wholesale and retail account for around 10% of gross value added in Europe, and with 30 million employees, around 13% of all workers are employed in the retail sector. Research in this area has therefore gained increasing attention and is well-needed across all retail sectors, from grocery to fashion retailing and consumer electronics. Major challenges for retailers are ensuring efficient operations while reflecting sustainability and resilience issues. Retail substantially contributes to emissions, resource consumption, and waste, driving the need for sustainable solution approaches. Simultaneously, retailers face increasing uncertainties in global markets, disrupting their operations and potentially threatening entire supply chains. Potential threats are climate impacts, political issues, and pandemics. These challenges must be incorporated into the planning approaches and require advanced decision support and tools.
Analytics and modeling are important levers to enhance the economic, environmental, and social sustainability of retail supply chains. This special issue aims to identify innovative contributions for sustainable and resilient retail operations via data-driven, quantitative, and future-oriented decision support. The special issue offers an excellent outlet for high-quality research approaches. The methodology used should align with the scope of the journal and include operations research, quantitative modeling and/or analytical approaches. We especially embrace contributions with a background in the retail industry or consumer goods, considering every part of the supply chain, from production to consumption.
2. Topics of the SI
Sustainability Analytics and Modeling publishes articles that develop and apply quantitative methods of analytics and operations research to take on global sustainability challenges. These challenges are many and broad in scope. They involve poverty, hunger, health, well-being, education, equality, water, sanitation, energy, economies, industry, infrastructure systems, smart communities, consumption and production, climate, peace, and justice, among other topics, all of which are targeted by the 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) of the United Nations. Topics that are of interest for this special issue include, but are not limited to:
Manuscript submission information:
3. Submission Guidelines
The Article Publishing Charge (APC) fee will be covered by the International Federation of Operational Research Societies (IFORS). Submitted papers must be original works not previously published or currently considered for publication elsewhere. The manuscripts should be prepared according to the Guide for Authors.
All manuscripts should be submitted electronically using the journal's online manuscript submission system (https://www.editorialmanager.com/samod/). When prompted for the article type, please select, "VSI: Sustainable and resilient retail supply chains".
On the Attach Files screen, please submit the Manuscript, Highlights, Cover Letter summarizing the paper’s contribution, and Conflict of Interest Declaration (template available at https://service.elsevier.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/286/supporthub/publishing).
At the Review Preferences screen, you may suggest potential reviewers for this submission and provide specific reasons for your suggestion in the comments box for each person.
Manuscripts submitted after the deadline may not be considered for the special issue and may be transferred, if accepted, to a regular issue.
4. Important Dates
Eligible submissions will be quickly submitted to the peer review process by the guest editors. The guest editors will work to ensure a maximum time of 10 weeks for the initial peer review process. Accepted papers will be published online quickly after acceptance such that papers submitted early will also be published well ahead of the special issue’s scheduled publication date.
Submission opens: April 1, 2025
Deadline for submissions: February 28, 2026
Targeted closure of first peer review process: March 10, 2026
(Latest) Publication: Fall 2026
Keywords:
Retail Operations, Sustainable Supply Chains, Resilient Supply Chains, Analytics and Modeling
Why publish in this Special Issue?