Replication Data for: The Dark Side of Innovation: How New SKUs Affect Brand Choice in the Presence of Consumer Uncertainty and Learning

However, the impact of new SKUs on the perceived quality, quality uncertainty and subsequent choice of the brand as a whole is, as of yet, not well understood. The authors study how new additions to the brand line shape consumers’ quality perceptions, and how this – next to the mere line length effect – influences their choice of brands over time.

They do so in the setting of an emerging market (China), where new product activity is particularly pervasive. Using a unique scanner panel dataset of Chinese households over the period 2011-2014, they estimate a Bayesian learning model that accommodates varying quality, on two CPG categories, and for two types of new-product additions (new sensory SKUs vs. new non-sensory SKUs).