(The) impact of same-day delivery on return behaviors across product categories

Abstract

The rapid evolution of e-commerce has led to significant advancements, with Same-Day Delivery (SDD) emerging as a notable trend. While prior studies have primarily focused on the positive impact of such service enhancement on sales, the effect on consumers' post-purchase behavior remains relatively unexplored. To address this research gap, I examine the effects of SDD on product returns, with a particular focus on how product categories—namely utilitarian and hedonic—may moderate this relationship. Drawing from the expectation-confirmation theory, I propose hypotheses that SDD enhances consumers' satisfaction by better aligning post-purchase perceived performance with consumers' pre-purchase initial expectations. By analyzing a unique natural experiment involving the most prominent bookseller in South Korea that implemented SDD, this finding suggests that the introduction of SDD not only amplifies sales but also leads to a significant decrease in number of returns. Notably, this reduction in returns is more pronounced for utilitarian goods compared to hedonic ones. This research deepens our understanding of how the quality of logistics in online retail interacts with product categories to influence consumers' pre-purchase and post-purchase behavior.