Customer reactions to variety: Too much of a good thing?

Studying product variety is an interesting and relevant area for research. Work in this area should build on careful understanding of both customers’ reactions to it and managers’ decision making with respect to it. This requires an interdisciplinary focus, drawing on work in information processing, channels, operations management, game theory, and managerial decision making. In fact, the major advances may come more from combining knowledge from the different areas rather than boring more deeply into a single one.