This study aims to address the research gap concerning the ethical perspectives of food delivery apps (FDAs) from the restaurant (merchant) standpoint within the sharing economy. Building on the Service-Dominant Logic (SDL) framework and the service ecosystem perspective, this research goes beyond the traditional focus on service attributes. It develops a B2B-focused conceptual model that integrates both service and ethical attributes, offering a holistic view of how value co-creation occurs among various actors on FDA platforms.
This study used web scraping to collect data, analyzing 5,010 reviews from Grab Merchants and 5,154 reviews from the GoBiz Merchant App on the Google Play Store. A deductive thematic analysis revealed a critical relationship between service quality and the ethical practices offered by FDAs within the overall ecosystem.
The deductive thematic analysis revealed a crucial interplay between service and ethical attributes within the FDA ecosystem. This underscores the importance of continuous collaboration to foster value co-creation among multiple stakeholders, including aggregators, merchants, customers and drivers.
The study contributes to the sharing economy literature by proposing a conceptual model that integrates service and ethical attributes, demonstrating their role in driving value co-creation within the framework of Service-Dominant Logic (S-D Logic).
