Night markets: entrepreneurship and achieving competitive advantage

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to propose a new model and examine how night market entrepreneurs have achieved a competitive advantage in strongly competitive markets.

Design/methodology/approach

Two statistics methods, multiple regression analysis and structural equation models (SEM), were used to test the hypotheses for a sample of 346 vendor cases.

Findings

The results indicate that competitive aggressiveness and being proactive are positively related to risk-taking among night market vendors, which, in turn, has a positive effect on innovativeness. Further, the findings also indicate that risk-taking positively influences innovativeness and, in a mediating role, also affects competitive advantages through innovativeness.

Practical implications

Results of this study suggest that if night market entrepreneurs demonstrate innovativeness, positively develop new products and new services and attract customers to buy them, then they will have unique and attractiveness in the night markets, thus giving themselves relative competitive advantage.

Originality/value

This research is the first comprehensive examination of entrepreneurship among night market entrepreneurs to study the competitive advantages of different facets, which may provide a benchmark for future studies.

Citation

Liu, C.-H.S. and Fang, Y.-P. (2016), "Night markets: entrepreneurship and achieving competitive advantage", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 28 No. 11, pp. 2374-2398. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJCHM-03-2015-0114