The Handelsverband Science Prize, worth 7,000 euros, is awarded in three categories. The selection of the winners is the responsibility of an eight-member jury consisting of leading representatives from academia and the professional world, including WU Professor Thomas Reutterer. The award ceremony took place at Schönbrunn Palace during the Retail Colloquium, attended by Minister of Science Eva-Maria Holzleitner.

Awards for “Best Master’s Thesis” and “Best Dissertation”

The award for Best Master’s Thesis went to Huihua Chen (“The Impact of ‘Please Keep It’ Refund Policies and the Effect on Customer Relationships and Future Consumer Behavior”) for her work on returns management. Peter Eigenschink was honored in the “Best Dissertation” category for his work on reducing excess inventory in the fashion retail sector (“Marketing Analytics for Sustainable & Efficient Retail Operations”). His dissertation was supervised by WU professors Thomas Reutterer (Marketing & Customer Analytics) and Nils Wlömert (Retailing & Data Science). 

Pictured: Elisa Zhu (St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences), Huihua Chen, and Peter Eigenschink (both WU Vienna) received awards. Utho Creusen, Norbert Scheele, and Maria Madlberger presented the prizes.