Uniformity in Collective Entrepreneurship: The Case of Food Retail Cooperatives in France
Résumé
Entrepreneurship can be either individual, collective, or both. Cooperatives and independent associated networks are groups of retail and service stores that pool their means. Curiously, there has been a lack of research on retail cooperatives. The objective of this research is to show how these organizations, whose cooperators have a dual status (they are both customers and co-owners of the cooperative), can face the uniformity challenge as efficiently as franchised networks do. The findings highlight the existence of various centralized, decentralized, and mixed processes. This research suggests a model for managing uniformity in food retail cooperatives.