Impact of channel power in the supply chain context - an empirical study on Taiwan apparel industry

To pursue the optimal operations performance and profitability of their own, channel members in a supply chain tend to manipulate the channel power to serve the purpose. It inevitably evokes the problems of channel conflict and leverage situation within the supply chain power regime. We employ French and Raven¿s approach on power sources along with Gaski¿s power and conflict theory and Howell¿s model to construct the hypotheses and allow the method of structure equation modeling (SEM) for path analysis. The objective is to explore how different power sources interwoven with economic or non- economic impact will interrelate to the channel power and downstream members¿ satisfaction in the Taiwan apparel industry. The outcome of this study provides an insight into how channel members take the advantage of channel power in favor of their operations performance.