“Emerging retail as ecosystem”, in Value co-creation: management challenges for business and society”

Objectives.This conceptual paperexplains how the retail concept (latent concept) emerges as ecosystem through the generation of institutional arrangementsand, for this reason, through the evolution of specific institutions that affect the retail concept and the actors involved. Methodology.The work is based on the Service-Dominant (SD)-Logic and Viable System Approach (VSA) frameworks. The SD-logic concepts are applied in order to define institutions and institutional arrangements within the ecosystem and the VSA is applied in order to distinguish the concept of “emergent” ecosystem from institutional arrangements. Findings.The identification of relevant institutions and institutional arrangements in the retail concept that are able to highlight the emergence of retail as ecosystem. Research limits.The proposed approach in this conceptual paper could be enriched with other theoretical perspectives and empirical explorations. Practical implications. In the process of retail evolution, it is useful for practitioners to manage a systemic view of the retail concept following the ecosystem paradigm because it provides a framework to understand the entangled relationships between industrial production, agriculture, logistics, distribution and consumptionsthat integrate resources and exchange valuebelonging to the same retail system.They follow the shared purpose to survive and co-create value through different actors in the market. Originality of the study.The eco-system paradigm is used to explain the latent concept of retail and to express the process of interaction between the multiplicity and variety of emerging institutions through resources integrations in the retail market.