CIC co-host of international Conference on Customer Management (Sept 10-12)

'Managing the Interface between Firms and Customers' is the theme of the 3rd Thought Leadership Conference on Customer Management, held from 10-12 September 2009 in Montabaur Castle, Germany. TheDepartment of Retailing and Customer Management (University of Cologne), the Customer Insights Center (FEB, Groningen) and the TNS Infratest Center for Customer Management (University of Münster) are hosting the conference. The co-chairs of this conference are Werner Reinartz (Cologne), Peter Verhoef (FEB) and Manfred Krafft (Münster).

More than 40 leading scholars from many different countries have confirmed their attendance. Prior thought leadership conferences have been organized in 2001 at Boston College, and in 2005 at the University of Connecticut.

The aim of the conference is to expand the field of customer management with special themes, such as customer participation in value creation, customer engagement in relationship development, customer engagement in customer-to-customer interactions and the influence of new media. Like with prior conferences the conference will result in a special issue of the Journal of Service Research, one of the leading academic journals in the field.