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Green Investment Strategies and Pricing Decisions in a Supply Chain Considering Blockchain Technology

Sustainability 2025, 17(14), 6491; https://doi.org/10.3390/su17146491

by Songshi Shao¹, Yutong Li¹, Xu Cheng^2,* and Jinzhu Qu³

Reviewer 1: Anonymous

Reviewer 2: Anonymous

Reviewer 3: Anonymous

Reviewer 4: Anonymous

Sustainability 2025, 17(14), 6491; https://doi.org/10.3390/su17146491

Submission received: 28 May 2025 / Revised: 8 July 2025 / Accepted: 8 July 2025 / Published: 16 July 2025

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Green Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Innovations for Sustainable Transport and Distribution)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

REVIEW OF: Green investment strategies and pricing decisions in a supply chain considering blockchain technology

Summary

This paper investigates a sustainable dual-channel supply chain comprising a manufacturer and an e-retailer, focusing on the adoption of blockchain technology by the e-retailer and low-carbon technology by the manufacturer. The study examines how these two strategies interact and influence pricing, carbon emission levels, consumer demand, and the overall supply chain performance. By constructing a Stackelberg game model with the manufacturer as the leader and the e-retailer as the follower, the paper derives and compares equilibrium decisions under four different strategy combinations: no adoption, only low-carbon adoption, only blockchain adoption, and joint adoption.

The model incorporates consumer environmental awareness and trust in product information, capturing how blockchain enhances transparency and how low-carbon efforts improve product sustainability. The analysis reveals conditions under which the adoption of either or both technologies leads to higher prices and profits, as well as scenarios where such investments may not be profitable. The study also highlights the interplay between environmental investments and information transparency in shaping consumer perception and supply chain outcomes. Numerical experiments validate the theoretical results and provide insights into the effects of key parameters, including consumer preferences, cost coefficients, and wholesale prices. The findings offer practical implications for supply chain members considering green and digital strategies in increasingly sustainability-conscious markets.

COMMENTS TO THE AUTHOR:

The research motivation is interesting and could imply decision support for some real-world dual-channel supply chains that fit the paper's description. However, I recommend that the authors address the below-mentioned concerns.

Major concerns

The introduction devotes excessive space to general background information. This level of detail risks distracting from the main research objectives. I recommend streamlining the background section by focusing more directly on the relevance of green investment and blockchain adoption within dual-channel supply chains.
While Section 5 presents detailed comparisons of pricing and green level decisions under different strategy combinations, it lacks a thorough analysis of "why" the manufacturer chooses to adopt low-carbon technology and "why" the e-retailer decides to implement blockchain technology. The current analysis primarily focuses on price and cost outcomes without adequately addressing the "strategic motivations" or incentives behind technology adoption by each party.

Clarifying these motivations would enrich the interpretation of the equilibrium results and provide stronger managerial implications. I recommend explicitly analyzing the incentive structure and behavioral rationale for each supply chain member’s technology adoption.

Minor concerns

The manuscript inconsistently uses the terms “e-retailer” and “e-tailer” to refer to the same entity. This may cause confusion for readers and reduce the overall clarity and professionalism of the paper. It is recommended that the authors choose one term and apply it consistently throughout the manuscript. “e-retailer” is slightly more formal and commonly used in academic literature, so it may be preferable for consistency and clarity.
The word “blockchain” is sometimes capitalized and sometimes not. Please standardize the usage (e.g., use lowercase “blockchain” unless it begins a sentence).
There are several grammatical issues and awkward phrasings (e.g., "founding" instead of "finding", "benefits to" instead of "benefits for"). Please careful proofreading and language polishing, to improve readability and professionalism.
In Section 5, the phrase “the manufacturer set a high sales price” should be corrected to “the manufacturer sets a high sales price” to maintain consistent verb tense.

Author Response

Thank you very much for your positive, detailed and constructive comments and suggestions. Below, we discuss how we addressed your comments and suggestions. We hope you will find our responses adequate and the revised manuscript satisfactory. However, we will be happy to address any more comments and suggestions that you and other reviewers may have in the next round of review.

Comments to the author: The research motivation is interesting and could imply decision support for some real-world dual-channel supply chains that fit the paper’s description. However, I recommend that the authors address the below-mentioned concerns.

Response: Thank you for your concise summary of the paper. We are glad that you believe “The research motivation is interesting and could imply decision support for some real-world dual-channel supply chains that fit the paper’s description.” We tried to address your concerns in the revision as detailed in the following.

Major concerns:

Comment 1. The introduction devotes excessive space to general background information. This level of detail risks distracting from the main research objectives. I recommend streamlining the background section by focusing more directly on the relevance of green investment and blockchain adoption within dual-channel supply chains.

Response: Thank you for your constructive comments and suggestions. We acknowledge that the general background information could be more concise to better highlight the research focus. We revised the introduction to reduce non-essential background details and retain only the most relevant context. We would like to clarify that we have discussed the relevance of green investment and blockchain adoption within dual-channel supply chains. Please refer to Page 3 of the revised manuscript for more details. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…With the rapid development of internet technology and e-commerce, online sales have experienced significant growth. An increasing number of manufacturers, such as HP, Nike, and Huawei, have established direct sales channels alongside traditional reselling channels. However, conflicts arise between direct sales and reselling channels, potentially leading to manufacturer malpractices such as information fraud and misreporting. In particular, compared to reselling channels, consumers may place greater trust in the environmental friendliness of products sold through direct sales channels.

Blockchain, as a disruptive and innovative technology, can ensure that information about product quality during the production process is transparent, tamper-proof, and verifiable by all stakeholders in the supply chain. Its core attributes, i.e., decentralized recordkeeping and immutable data, enable trustworthy information sharing, which has transformative potential not only in supply chains but also in other fields such as the art industry, where authenticity and provenance of artworks are critical. By enhancing consumer trust and reducing information asymmetry, blockchain improves purchasing confidence and supports sustainable consumption behavior. Therefore, blockchain technology has garnered significant attention from both academia and industry due to its intrinsic characteristics, e.g., decentralization and traceability….”

Comment 2. While Section 5 presents detailed comparisons of pricing and green level decisions under different strategy combinations, it lacks a thorough analysis of "why" the manufacturer chooses to adopt low-carbon technology and "why" the e-retailer decides to implement blockchain technology. The current analysis primarily focuses on price and cost outcomes without adequately addressing the "strategic motivations" or incentives behind technology adoption by each party. Clarifying these motivations would enrich the interpretation of the equilibrium results and provide stronger managerial implications. I recommend explicitly analyzing the incentive structure and behavioral rationale for each supply chain member’s technology adoption.

Response: We sincerely thank the reviewer for this valuable suggestion. In response, we have revised Section 5 to explicitly analyze the strategic motivations and incentive structures behind the manufacturer’s decision to adopt low-carbon technology and the e-retailer’s decision to implement blockchain technology. Specifically, we explain that the manufacturer adopts low-carbon technology not only to improve environmental performance but also as a differentiation strategy to enhance brand value, meet policy expectations, and appeal to environmentally conscious consumers. Similarly, we clarify that the e-retailer implements blockchain technology to strengthen product transparency and credibility, reduce information asymmetry, and build consumer trust in green claims. These revisions aim to enrich the interpretation of the equilibrium results and provide more meaningful managerial implications regarding the strategic value of green investment and blockchain adoption in supply chain coordination.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…

Proposition 4. The equilibrium price decisions under the strategy combinations NN and LN satisfy:

(1) ;

(2) .

From Proposition 4, both the direct sales price and the retail price under strategy LN are higher than those under strategy NN. This outcome reflects not only increased production and procurement costs due to the manufacturer’s adoption of low-carbon technology, but also the strategic motivations of both supply chain members. The manufacturer adopts low-carbon technology as a proactive strategy to differentiate its products in a market with rising environmental awareness, enhance brand image, and comply with long-term sustainability goals. The added environmental value justifies a higher price in the direct channel, allowing the manufacturer to recover green investment costs while appealing to eco-conscious consumers. Simultaneously, the e-retailer faces higher wholesale prices but benefits from increased consumer willingness to pay for green products. To sustain profitability and align with the perceived value of green products, the e-retailer sets a higher retail price. Thus, the pricing decisions under LN are driven by both cost pass-through and the shared incentive to signal product sustainability and capture value from green market segments.

Proposition 5. The equilibrium pricing decisions under strategy combinations NN and LB satisfy:

(1) ;

(2) .

From Proposition 5, both the direct sales price and the retail price under the strategy combination LB are higher than those under the strategy combination NN. The manufacturer adopts low-carbon technology not only to meet regulatory or environmental targets but also as a proactive differentiation strategy to appeal to consumers with strong sustainability preferences, enhance brand reputation, and capture premium market segments. The e-retailer, in turn, implements blockchain technology to strengthen consumer trust in the authenticity of green claims by enhancing transparency and traceability. Blockchain adoption reduces information asymmetry and increases consumers’ perceived value of low-carbon products, leading to stronger purchase intent and greater price acceptance. Together, these strategic moves create a synergistic effect, i.e., allowing both parties to charge higher prices and extract greater value from environmentally conscious consumers. Thus, the pricing decisions under strategy LB stem from both cost recovery and deliberate efforts to reinforce competitive positioning through sustainable and trustworthy supply chain practices.

Proposition 6. The equilibrium decisions under the strategy combinations LN and LB satisfy:

(1) if , and otherwise;

(2) if , and otherwise;

(3) if , and otherwise.

From Proposition 6, the equilibrium prices and the green level decisions under the strategy combination LB are not always higher than those under the strategy combination LN. This variation highlights the strategic motivations and conditional incentives driving technology adoption. When the wholesale price exceeds a threshold, the manufacturer benefits more from selling through the e-retailer, which encourages it to raise the product’s green level to meet demand for sustainable products. In this case, the e-retailer’s adoption of blockchain strengthens consumer trust, thus incentivizing the manufacturer to set higher prices reflecting enhanced product value. Conversely, when the wholesale price is low, the manufacturer’s margin from e-retailer sales shrinks, diminishing its incentive to maintain a high green level. If consumer preference for low-carbon products is weak, the manufacturer may strategically reduce green investment to lower production costs. Similarly, the e-retailer balances the benefits of blockchain-enabled transparency with its increased operational costs. It raises prices only when the enhanced green attributes justify consumer willingness to pay. Therefore, the adoption of blockchain motivates green investment and premium pricing only under favorable market and cost conditions, reflecting the nuanced strategic interplay between investment incentives, consumer behavior, and channel economics.

…”

Minor concerns:

Comment 1. The manuscript inconsistently uses the terms “e-retailer” and “e-tailer” to refer to the same entity. This may cause confusion for readers and reduce the overall clarity and professionalism of the paper. It is recommended that the authors choose one term and apply it consistently throughout the manuscript. “e-retailer” is slightly more formal and commonly used in academic literature, so it may be preferable for consistency and clarity.

Response: Thanks for your helpful suggestion. Following your suggestion, we substituted e-retailer for e-tailer to show consistency and to provide clarity. Please refer to the revised manuscript for more details.

Comment 2. The word “blockchain” is sometimes capitalized and sometimes not. Please standardize the usage (e.g., use lowercase “blockchain” unless it begins a sentence).

Response: Thanks you very much for spotting this problem. We really appreciate your meticulosity in reading this manuscript. We used uniformly lowercase “blockchain” in a sentence to professionally describe. Please refer to the revised manuscript for more details.

Comment 3. There are several grammatical issues and awkward phrasings (e.g., “founding” instead of “finding”, “benefits to” instead of “benefits for”). Please careful proofreading and language polishing, to improve readability and professionalism.

Response: Thank you for your valuable comment and suggestion. We sincerely apologize for these oversights and addressed all the grammatical issues identified. We further conducted a comprehensive language polishing of the full text to enhance its clarity and academic rigor. Please let us know if you identify any remaining language concerns that need addressing. However, we found that “benefits to” is not appropriate in the sentence: “Lu et al. (2024) proposed mathematical models, examining blockchain introduction of an e-retailer, and finding that blockchain introduction benefits to the online retailer under a certain condition”, because “benefits” is a verb. We revised “benefits to” to “benefits”. Please refer to Page 7 of the revised manuscript for more details. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…Lu et al. (2024) proposed mathematical models, examining blockchain introduction of an e-retailer, and finding that blockchain introduction benefits the online retailer under a certain condition…”

Comment 4. In Section 5, the phrase “the manufacturer set a high sales price” should be corrected to “the manufacturer sets a high sales price” to maintain consistent verb tense.

Response: We thank the reviewer for pointing out the inconsistency in verb tense. In accordance with the suggestion, we have corrected the phrase “the manufacturer set a high sales price” to “the manufacturer sets a high sales price” in Section 5 to ensure consistency in tense throughout the manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This manuscript studies a dual-channel low-carbon supply chain consisting of a manufacturer and an e-retailer, focusing on the strategic adoption of blockchain technology by the e-retailer and low-carbon technology by the manufacturer. By establishing a Stackelberg game framework, the paper examines the interplay between green investment and information transparency, deriving equilibrium decisions under multiple strategy combinations. The study also conducts comparative and sensitivity analyses to evaluate the effects of key parameters on pricing, product greenness, and profits.

Overall, the topic is timely and aligns well with the scope of the special issue " Green Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Innovations for Sustainable Transport and Distribution " of the Sustainability. The integration of environmental sustainability and digital transparency into supply chain strategy is both relevant and impactful. The modeling framework and solution methods appear sound. However, the manuscript requires several improvements before it can be considered for publication. Specific comments are detailed below:

The introduction contains extensive background and policy details, which, while informative, make the section quite long and somewhat unfocused. It is recommended to streamline the narrative by emphasizing the research motivation and academic significance, reducing excessive industry-specific details that may distract from the main argument.
The research framework and methods (e.g., Stackelberg game, dual-channel structure, strategic interaction) are introduced rather late. It would improve clarity and flow if these key concepts and the methodological approach were briefly presented earlier in the introduction.
The benefits of blockchain in enhancing information transparency and consumer trust are mentioned multiple times. Consider consolidating these points to avoid redundancy and improve the conciseness and readability of the text.
The literature review is divided into three streams, which is a good structure. However, the transitions between these streams are abrupt and could be improved by briefly summarizing how each stream relates to your research and highlighting overlaps or gaps.
The literature review mainly summarizes existing studies but lacks critical evaluation of their limitations or contradictions. Authors should incorporating more discussion on where current research falls short or what questions remain unanswered would better justify the need for the study.
Why didn’t the authors use real demand data in the numerical studies? The authors need to explain this further. Generally speaking, more accurate and reliable conclusions can be obtained through case studies with real data, thus improving the credibility and applicability of the proposed models.

Author Response

Thank you very much for your detailed and constructive comments and suggestions. Below, we discuss how we addressed your comments and suggestions. We hope that you will find our efforts in revising the paper satisfactory and our responses adequate. However, we are willing to address any more comments and suggestions that you and other reviewers may have in the next round of review.

Comments: This manuscript studies a dual-channel low-carbon supply chain consisting of a manufacturer and an e-retailer, focusing on the strategic adoption of blockchain technology by the e-retailer and low-carbon technology by the manufacturer. By establishing a Stackelberg game framework, the paper examines the interplay between green investment and information transparency, deriving equilibrium decisions under multiple strategy combinations. The study also conducts comparative and sensitivity analyses to evaluate the effects of key parameters on pricing, product greenness, and profits.

Overall, the topic is timely and aligns well with the scope of the special issue “Green Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Innovations for Sustainable Transport and Distribution” of the Sustainability. The integration of environmental sustainability and digital transparency into supply chain strategy is both relevant and impactful. The modeling framework and solution methods appear sound. However, the manuscript requires several improvements before it can be considered for publication. Specific comments are detailed below.

Response: Thank you for your concise summary of the paper. We are glad that you believe “the topic is timely and aligns well with the scope of the special issue “Green Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Innovations for Sustainable Transport and Distribution” of the Sustainability. The integration of environmental sustainability and digital transparency into supply chain strategy is both relevant and impactful. The modeling framework and solution methods appear sound.” We tried to address your concerns in the revision as detailed in the following.

Comment 1. The introduction contains extensive background and policy details, which, while informative, make the section quite long and somewhat unfocused. It is recommended to streamline the narrative by emphasizing the research motivation and academic significance, reducing excessive industry-specific details that may distract from the main argument.

Response: Thank you for your kind comments and suggestions. We fully agree with you that the introduction contains extensive background and policy details. We deleted some policy provisions, and emphasized the research motivation and academic significance. Please refer to Page 4 of the revised manuscript and our response to Comment 1 of Reviewer 1 for more details. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…this work aims to construct Stackelberg game models to analyze the strategic choices regarding the manufacturer’s green investment and the e-retailer’s adoption of blockchain technology (i.e., the strategic interactions between the manufacturer and the retailer), and endeavours to explore the pricing and green level decisions of the manufacturer and the pricing decision of the e-retailer under a dual-channel structure, so as to broaden the scope of research in this field and provide decision supports for business firms….”

Comment 2. The research framework and methods (e.g., Stackelberg game, dual-channel structure, strategic interaction) are introduced rather late. It would improve clarity and flow if these key concepts and the methodological approach were briefly presented earlier in the introduction.

Response: Thank you for your kind comment and suggestion. We fully agree with you that the key concepts and the methodological approach need to be introduced earlier in the Introduction. In the Introduction, we introduced Stackelberg games, dual-channel structure, and strategic interactions. Please refer to Page 4 of the revised manuscript for more details. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…this work aims to construct Stackelberg game models to analyze the strategic choices regarding the manufacturer’s green investment and the e-retailer’s adoption of blockchain technology (i.e., the strategic interactions between the manufacturer and the retailer), and endeavours to explore the pricing and green level decisions of the manufacturer and the pricing decision of the e-retailer under a dual-channel structure, so as to broaden the scope of research in this field and provide decision supports for business firms. ….”

Comment 3: The benefits of blockchain in enhancing information transparency and consumer trust are mentioned multiple times. Consider consolidating these points to avoid redundancy and improve the conciseness and readability of the text.

Response: We thank the reviewer for this helpful suggestion. In response, we have reviewed the manuscript and consolidated repeated discussions on the benefits of blockchain in enhancing information transparency and consumer trust. These points are now presented in a more concise and integrated manner to improve readability and avoid redundancy, while maintaining the clarity and emphasis on blockchain’s strategic role in the supply chain.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…Blockchain, as a disruptive and innovative technology, can ensure that information about product quality during the production process is transparent, tamper-proof, and verifiable by all stakeholders in the supply chain. Its core attributes, i.e., decentralized recordkeeping and immutable data, enable trustworthy information sharing, which has transformative potential not only in supply chains but also in other fields such as the art industry, where authenticity and provenance of artworks are critical. By enhancing consumer trust and reducing information asymmetry, blockchain improves purchasing confidence and supports sustainable consumption behavior. Therefore, Blockchain technology has garnered significant attention from both academia and industry due to its intrinsic characteristics, e.g., decentralization and traceability.…”

Comment 4. The literature review is divided into three streams, which is a good structure. However, the transitions between these streams are abrupt and could be improved by briefly summarizing how each stream relates to your research and highlighting overlaps or gaps.

Response: Thank you for your constructive suggestion. Following your help suggestion, we added some descriptions to fill gaps among three streams. The following is a newly added sentence in Section 2 in the revised manuscripts on pages 6-8.

“…The above related works investigated the green supply chain decisions from vary perspectives, but rarely from the blockchain perspective. Blockchain technology can help consumers obtain product information and trace the product production. Especially for a green supply chain, the introduction of this technology makes more attractive to green preference consumers. Thus, it is necessary to study the impact of blockchain on the green supply chain. Although Gu et al. (2025) examined blockchain adoption of the manufacturer in a low-carbon supply chain, and primarily focused on competition between low-carbon and ordinary products. Moreover, they did not regard the low-carbon investment as an important strategy and ignored the widely used dual-channel sales mode in practice. Thus, this work fill these gaps by incorporating both green investment and dual-channel structure into blockchain framework. …

…Although some works examined the green supply chain decisions with blockchain, ignored how blockchain affects the dual-channel sale mode. Lu et al. (2024) investigated blockchain adoption of an e-retailer under the dual-channel sale mode, but they considered the online and offline stores of the e-retaler rather than the direct sales and wholesale sales channels of a manufacturer. Actually, this type of sales mode is widely implemented by manufacturers in practice, such as Gree, Lenovo, Apple and other groups. Accordingly, studying the impact of blockchain on the green supply chain with the manufacturer considering direct sales and wholesale sales channels is both timely and practically meaningful. …

… In previously work on dual-channel supplier chain, only Zhang et al (2024) and Modak et al (2024) investigated blockchain adoption, but did not consider low-carbon products. The study of low-carbon product supply chains is of significant practical relevance, as it responds to both global carbon reduction policies and the growing trend of green consumption. It also helps enterprises optimize their operational strategies while meeting environmental regulations, thereby achieving a balance between economic performance and environmental sustainability. …”

Comment 5. The literature review mainly summarizes existing studies but lacks critical evaluation of their limitations or contradictions. Authors should incorporating more discussion on where current research falls short or what questions remain unanswered would better justify the need for the study.

Response: Thanks you very much for spotting out this problem. Your suggestion inspired us to improve literature review. We added some sentences to summarize the limitation of works related to this study. The following is the relevant part of the revised manuscript on pages 6-9.

…Tang et al. (2023) investigated carbon emission decision for dual-channel supply chains with retailer behavior preferences, and ignored effects of blockchain introduction. Although Lu et al. (2024) incorporated blockchain technology into the dual-channel supply chain, and assumed the dual-channel to be a combination of the online and offline retailers, but they did not consider the low-carbon product. Furthermore, Liao et al. (2025) and Babaei et al. (2025) investigated blockchain introduction of a supply chain with green products. Their focus was limited to the operational decisions within single-channel supply chains. …”

Comment 6: Why didn’t the authors use real demand data in the numerical studies? The authors need to explain this further. Generally speaking, more accurate and reliable conclusions can be obtained through case studies with real data, thus improving the credibility and applicability of the proposed models.

Response: We thank the reviewer for this insightful comment. We fully agree that incorporating real demand data can enhance the credibility and practical relevance of research findings. The data for this manuscript came from a fashion product retailer in Shenyang, China, is used to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed models. However, due to business confidentiality, the true market data are not used, but instead, reasonable values are assigned to the associated parameters for the computational experiments. This study aims to develop a theoretical game-theoretic framework to explore the strategic interactions between supply chain members under different technology adoption scenarios. The numerical studies are designed to illustrate the model’s behavior, conduct sensitivity analysis, and generate managerial insights under a controlled and generalizable setting. Therefore, we use normalized and representative parameter values commonly adopted in the literature to ensure analytical tractability and allow for broader applicability of the results.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…

Numerical studies

Numerical analyses are performed to investigate the effects of , , and on the supply chain members’ profits, offering managerial insights into strategic decisions. Data from a fashion product retailer in Shenyang, China, is used to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed models. However, due to business confidentiality, the true market data are not used, but instead, reasonable values are assigned to the associated parameters for the computational experiments. The parameter values used in the numerical analysis are summarized as follows. The market potential represents the maximum potential demand under ideal conditions, and the market share of the direct sales channel . The competition intensity of price reflects moderate substitutability between the two channels. The wholesale price . The blockchain cost . The green trust coefficient of consumer , and the low-carbon preference of consumer . All parameters are dimensionless or normalized for the purpose of comparative and sensitivity analysis. Unless otherwise specified, the parameter values used in the experiments are set as the default for the analysis.

…”

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript proposes a game-theoretic framework to examine the strategic interactions between a manufacturer and an e-retailer within a dual-channel supply chain, demonstrating certain research value. Nevertheless, the paper necessitates substantial revisions to enhance its theoretical underpinnings, methodological rigor, and presentational clarity before it can be considered for publication. My review opinion is a major revision. The specific review comments are as follows:

The abstract description is not standardized, the description is incomplete, and there is a lack of research background and purpose.
Please confirm if the citation format of the literature meets the requirements of the journal.
The article studies low-carbon supply chains, but there is no relevant content on how to reduce carbon emissions. So, in what aspects is low-carbon reflected?
Line 49: Determine if the citation format meets the requirements of the journal.
Lines 57-64: Do these references have any causal relationship with manufacturers' cautious consideration of green technology as mentioned earlier?
Lines 64-67: Why can it be determined from the above literature to study a dual channel supply chain composed of manufacturers and electronic retailers? The previous text did not explain the content of dual channel supply chain.
Line 66: Why emphasize channel competition and environmental considerations?
Line 98: Which part of the study reflects that “green investment enhances market differentiation”?
Lines 81-83: Is there a problem with the causal logic of this paragraph? Is it because of the functions of blockchain that it has attracted a lot of attention from academia and industry?
Line 112: "Manufacturer determines pricing" is setting retail prices?
Is the expression “manufacturer decides on green level decision” accurate on line 112? Is there any confusion with the concept of green investment strategies in research?
Line 114: Does the phrase “manufacturers investing in low-carbon products” also belong to green investment strategies? Is there a relationship between the green investment and green level decisions mentioned earlier and the investment in low-carbon products here? Can you provide a unified explanation? These make me feel that the article blurs the research content in that section.
Lines 135-158: Can the main findings of this study be summarized in the introduction section? What aspects does the model construction and solution in the following text address?
Line 152: Does “low-carbon investment” mean “green investment” ? Please clarify the difference between the two and determine if the statement is appropriate for the topic.
Line 165: The theoretical section has many concepts that would merit the creation of sub-sections, as this would make it more straightforward how important the concepts are to the study.
Lines 207-217: What is this section of literature used to illustrate?
Line 165: This section of literature mainly focuses on three parts: low carbon supply chain, blockchain technology, and dual channel supply chain. However, they do not provide detailed causal relationships with the content of this study. The conclusion is only briefly explained in lines 241-243. Please correct this.
Line 260: Is the "green supply chain" mentioned in Table 1 the "low-carbon supply chain" that the article aims to study? Please confirm this.
Line 290: Model assumptions need to be made before constructing and solving the model. Please complete this section.
Line 299: Is the manufacturer's strategic choice to adopt low-carbon technology? Is this related to green investment strategies? Please explain this point.
Line 304: Please prove the rationality of the demand function setting.
Line 310: There are incorrect references, please correct them.
Line 339: How is set in Equation 8? Please prove the rationality of this setting.
Line 426: "In order to consider blockchain and low-carbon technology," is low-carbon technology a green investment strategy? Is this related to the research topic of the article? Please carefully clarify the problems addressed in this study.
Lines 503-504: Please justify the selection of parameter values for this study. What do these parameters mean? In what units are they given? Please complete all of this.
Line 576: This section does not belong to the conclusion of this study. Please correct this part of the content.
Line 594: This section deserves a subheading to make the content look more intuitive.
Line 604: Does the format of the references comply with the requirements of the journal? Please compare and correct carefully.

Author Response

Comments: The manuscript proposes a game-theoretic framework to examine the strategic interactions between a manufacturer and an e-retailer within a dual-channel supply chain, demonstrating certain research value. Nevertheless, the paper necessitates substantial revisions to enhance its theoretical underpinnings, methodological rigor, and presentational clarity before it can be considered for publication. My review opinion is a major revision. The specific review comments are as follows:

Response: We sincerely thank the reviewer for recognizing the research value of our manuscript and for providing thoughtful and constructive feedback. We acknowledge the need to enhance the theoretical foundations, methodological rigor, and presentation quality of the paper. In response, we have carefully revised the manuscript in accordance with the specific comments provided. These revisions include clarifying model assumptions, strengthening the justification for key formulations, improving the explanation of strategic motivations, refining technical details, and enhancing the overall clarity and coherence of the text. We believe these improvements significantly enhance the quality of the manuscript, and we truly appreciate your guidance in this process.

Comment 1. The abstract description is not standardized, the description is incomplete, and there is a lack of research background and purpose.

Response: Thank you for your kind comment and suggestion. We revised the abstract to include a description of the research background and purpose. The abstract quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…With rising environmental awareness, numerous firms are transitioning to green investment, such as low-carbon production. However, consumer adoption of low-carbon products remains low due to transparency concerns. Many firms are leveraging blockchain to address information asymmetry in the supply chain, thereby building consumer confidence in low-carbon products. The purpose of this work is provide decision supports for business firms by analyzing the strategic choices regarding the manufacturer’s green investment and the e-retailer’s adoption of blockchain technology. Three strategy combinations are considered, including the baseline strategy combination without green investment and blockchain technology (NN), the strategy combination with only green investment (LN), and the strategy combination with both green investment and blockchain technology (LB). The optimal pricing and green level decisions are derived, and the conditions under which green investment and blockchain technology are beneficial to the supply chain members are examined. The findings suggest that the e-retailer can obtain the highest profit without adopting blockchain technology if it holds a substantial or extremely low market share, if the consumers’ low-carbon preference is at a low to medium level, or if the consumer green trust coefficient is high when the manufacturer implements the green investment strategy. When consumers exhibit a weak preference for low-carbon products, the strategy combination NN is optimal for the supply chain members. The strategy combination LB becomes optimal if the consumer green trust coefficient is near or below the moderate threshold, if the market share of a channel is neither extremely high nor low, or if consumers exhibit a strong preference for low-carbon products…”

Comment 2. Please confirm if the citation format of the literature meets the requirements of the journal.

Response: Thank you for your constructive suggestion. Following your helpful suggestion, we revised the citation format to comply with the requirements of the journal. Please refer to the revised manuscript for more details.

Comment 3: The article studies low-carbon supply chains, but there is no relevant content on how to reduce carbon emissions. So, in what aspects is low-carbon reflected?

Response: We thank the reviewer for highlighting this important point. In our revised manuscript, we have clarified that the “low-carbon” aspect is reflected through the manufacturer’s decision to invest in green technology, which determines the product’s green level. A higher green level indicates a greater reduction in carbon emissions during the production process, achieved through cleaner production methods or environmentally friendly materials. This green level directly influences both production cost and consumer demand, especially for environmentally conscious consumers. While we do not model carbon emissions quantitatively, we capture their impact implicitly through the strategic trade-off between green investment costs and market benefits. This clarification has been added to the introduction to better convey how low-carbon considerations are incorporated into the framework.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“… In this study, the low-carbon attribute is modeled through the manufacturer's green level decision, which represents the extent to which carbon emissions are reduced during production via green technologies or environmentally friendly materials. A higher green level reflects a more substantial reduction in carbon emissions, aligning with the low-carbon supply chain objectives.…”

Comment 4. Line 49: Determine if the citation format meets the requirements of the journal.

Response: Thank you for your insightful comment. We cited literature following the format requirement of the journal. Please refer to the revised manuscript for more details.

Comment 5. Lines 57-64: Do these references have any causal relationship with manufacturers' cautious consideration of green technology as mentioned earlier?

Response: Thank you for your insightful question. These references primarily demonstrate that existing literature has investigated the green investment strategies from various perspectives. Such strategies are closely linked to the green technology, and generally refer to the business decisions on whether to adopt green technology. In addition, the discussion in Lines 57-64 highlights that the work related to green technology provides the motivation for this study to focus on the green investment strategies for a dual-channel supply chain. this work builds upon existing research by examining green investment decisions in this specific context. This point is reported in Lines 64-67, as follows

“… Motivated by these studies, this work investigates the applicability of green investment strategies in a dual-channel supply chain comprising a manufacturer and an e-retailer, with particular emphasis on channel competition and environmental considerations. …”

Comment 6. Lines 64-67: Why can it be determined from the above literature to study a dual channel supply chain composed of manufacturers and electronic retailers? The previous text did not explain the content of dual channel supply chain.

Response: Thank you for your constructive comment. We added descriptions to highlight the necessity of studying green investment strategies in a dual-channel supply chain. The following is the relevant part of the revised manuscript on page 2.

“…The dual-channel sales mode has been widely adopted by manufacturers in practice, as seen in companies such as Gree, Huawei, and Lenovo. This sales structure also significantly influences green investment strategies. On the one hand, the manufacturer plays a leading role in adopting green technologies and determines whether products possess environmentally friendly attributes. On the other hand, the e-retailer serves as direct links to consumers, effectively communicating the value of green products and shaping green purchasing behavior. In a dual-channel supply chain, the demand responses to green products differ between online and offline channels, thereby affecting the manufacturer incentives for green investment. Therefore, studying green investment strategies in this context is essential for aligning the behaviors of supply chain members and promoting sustainable transformation. …”

Comment 7. Line 66: Why emphasize channel competition and environmental considerations?

Response: This work emphasizes channel competition and environmental considerations, primarily based on the following real-world context: With the widespread implementation of global carbon tax policies and the significant increase in consumer environmental awareness, green transformation has become an inevitable trend in industry development. Under the typical dual-channel mode (i.e., the manufacturer produces a product, wholesales it to the e-retailer, and simultaneously sells it through its online channel), price competition and market share conflicts among supply chain members are already prominent. Green investments (such as low-carbon production) not only reshape the cost structure of the supply chain but also significantly influence consumers’ purchasing preferences, thereby further intensifying competition among channels. Therefore, it is crucial to pay attention to channel competition and environmental factors.

Comment 8. Line 98: Which part of the study reflects that “green investment enhances market differentiation”?

Response: Thank you for your excellent comment. Zhu et al. (2023) demonstrated that companies across diverse sectors are strategically focusing on the development and marketing of low-carbon products, aiming not only to satisfy this growing demand but also to solidify their competitive edge. Gu et al. (2025) argued that while consumers are willing to pay a premium for low-carbon products, some consumers may still be financially restricted from purchasing such products. Therefore, during the transition, manufacturers may not immediately produce exclusively low-carbon products; they may simultaneously produce ordinary products, which consumers will still purchase. Low-carbon products and ordinary products coexist and contend within the market.

These two studies demonstrate that green investment enhances market competition (i.e., market differentiation). However, we recognized that the initial expression was not entirely appropriate and therefore revised the statement. Please refer to Page 3 of the revised manuscript for more details. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…While prior studies demonstrate that green investments enhance the eco-friendliness of the manufacturing process and the advancement of the sustainability of green supply chains, and blockchain improves supply chain traceability (Gu et al., 2025; Tian and Bai, 2025).…”

Comment 9. Lines 81-83: Is there a problem with the causal logic of this paragraph? Is it because of the functions of blockchain that it has attracted a lot of attention from academia and industry?

Response: Thank you for your constructive comments. The original statement does indeed lack rigorous causal logic. The growing attention toward blockchain technology should properly be understood as the combined outcome of its core functionalities and industry demands. We revised the statement “In addition, blockchain technology can improve consumer purchasing preferences and, to a certain extent, increase consumer trust, thus attracting considerable attention from both academics and industry practitioners”. Please refer to Page 3 of the revised manuscript for more details. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…blockchain technology has garnered significant attention from both academia and industry due to its intrinsic characteristics, e.g., decentralization and traceability.…”

Comment 10. Line 112: “Manufacturer determines pricing” is setting retail prices?

Response: Thank you for your good comment. The manufacturer produces a product, wholesales it to the e-retailer, and simultaneously sells it through its online channel at a retail price. Therefore, manufacturer determines the retail price of the direct sales channel.

Comment 11. Is the expression “manufacturer decides on green level decision” accurate on line 112? Is there any confusion with the concept of green investment strategies in research?

Response: Thank you for kind your comments. “Green level decision” and “green investment strategy” are different concepts. This paper discusses the manufacturer’s strategic decision (whether to adopt green investment strategies, i.e., low-carbon production) and operational decision (determining the green level of low-carbon products).

Comment 12. Line 114: Does the phrase “manufacturers investing in low-carbon products” also belong to green investment strategies? Is there a relationship between the green investment and green level decisions mentioned earlier and the investment in low-carbon products here? Can you provide a unified explanation? These make me feel that the article blurs the research content in that section.

Response: Thank you for your kind comments and suggestions. In our manuscript, the manufacturer adopt green investment strategy indicates that it produces low-carbon products. Green level means the green level of low-carbon products. This paper discusses the manufacturer’s strategic decision (whether to adopt green investment strategies, i.e., low-carbon production) and operational decision (determining the green level of low-carbon products).

Comment 13. Lines 135-158: Can the main findings of this study be summarized in the introduction section? What aspects does the model construction and solution in the following text address?

Response: Thank you for your good comments and suggestions. We moved the findings to Subsection 7.1 of the revised manuscript. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…

7.1 Research findings

The main findings of this work are summarized in the following.

(1) When the manufacturer adopts the green investment strategy, the e-retailer achieves maximum profit without using blockchain technology if it holds a substantial or very low market share. Conversely, the e-retailer obtains the highest profit with blockchain technology if it has a moderate market share.

(2) The wholesale price has no effect on the optimal strategy combination.

(3) Under the strategy combination LN, the greater the consumers’ trust in the green attributes of products sold through the e-retailer, the more beneficial it is for the supply chain members. The strategy combination LB yields optimal profits for both supply chain members when the consumer green trust coefficient is below or slightly above the moderate level. The e-retailer obtains the highest profit without blockchain technology if the consumer green trust coefficient is high.

(4) When consumers’ low-carbon preference is weak, the supply chain members obtain the highest profit with the strategy combination NN. As this preference strengthens, the manufacturer obtains higher profit if it conducts the green investment. When the consumers’ low-carbon preference is at a low to medium level, the e-retailer can still obtain the highest profit without adopting blockchain technology when the manufacturer conducts the green investment. When consumers exhibit a high level of low-carbon preference, the strategy combination LB leads to the highest profits for both parties.

(5) Under the strategy combinations LN and LB, the selling prices and the product green levels increase as consumer consumers’ low-carbon preference increases. When the wholesale price is high, the selling prices and product green levels under strategy combination LB is higher than those under the strategy combination LN. Among all strategy combinations, the selling prices under strategy NN are the lowest.

…”

In the following text of the revised manuscript, we developed the Stackelberg game models under the strategy combinations NN, LN and LB. The backward induction approach is used to solve the models. By comparing the optimal decisions and profits under different scenarios, we determined the optimal pricing and green level decisions, and explored the conditions under which green investment and blockchain technology are beneficial to the supply chain members.

Comment 14. Line 152: Does “low-carbon investment” mean “green investment”? Please clarify the difference between the two and determine if the statement is appropriate for the topic.

Response: Thank you for your constructive comment and suggestion. “Low-carbon investment” means “green investment”. I apologize for the inconsistency of these words. In order not to create confusion, we replaced low-carbon investment with green investment.

Comment 15. Line 165: The theoretical section has many concepts that would merit the creation of sub-sections, as this would make it more straightforward how important the concepts are to the study.

Response: Thank you for your constructive suggestion. We also fully agree with you that the literature review benefits from a more structured organization. Following your suggestion, we reorganized Section 2 by introducing sub-sections to clearly present and categorize the relevant literature. Please refer to Sections 2 of the revised manuscript for more details.

Comment 16. Lines 207-217: What is this section of literature used to illustrate?

Response: Thank you for your excellent question. This section corresponds the second paragraph of sub-section 2.2, which comprises two paragraphs discussing prior research on blockchain technology from different perspectives. The first paragraph reviews studies focusing on blockchain adoption in e-commence supply chains and under behavioral preferences. The second paragraph highlights research examining blockchain adoption in semiconductor chip, green, and dual-channel supply chains. Among these, the studies by Dou et al. (2024) and Lu et al. (2024) are most closely related to the present work.

Comment 17. Line 165: This section of literature mainly focuses on three parts: low carbon supply chain, blockchain technology, and dual channel supply chain. However, they do not provide detailed causal relationships with the content of this study. The conclusion is only briefly explained in lines 241-243. Please correct this.

Response: Thank you for your constructive suggestion. Low-carbon supply, blockchain technology and dual-channel supply chain are closely related to this work. We reviewed studies focusing on each stream from various perspectives, and stated the most relevant prior studies in each stream. Furthermore, we added some sentences to highlight the connection and distinctions between our research and existing literature at the ending of each sub-section in Section called literature review. The following is the relevant part of the revised manuscript on pages 6-8.

“…The above related works investigated the green supply chain decisions from vary perspectives, but rarely from the blockchain perspective. Blockchain technology can help consumers obtain product information and trace the product production. Especially for a green supply chain, the introduction of this technology makes more attractive to green preference consumers. Thus, it is necessary to study the impact of blockchain on the green supply chain. Although Gu et al. (2025) examined blockchain adoption of the manufacturer in a low-carbon supply chain, and primarily focused on competition between low-carbon and ordinary products. Moreover, they did not regard green investment as an important strategy and ignored the widely used dual-channel sales mode in practice. Thus, this work fill these gaps by incorporating both green investment and dual-channel structure into blockchain framework. …

…In previously work on dual-channel supplier chain, only Zhang et al (2024) and Modak et al (2024) investigated blockchain adoption, but did not consider low-carbon products. The study of low-carbon product supply chains is of significant practical relevance, as it responds to both global carbon reduction policies and the growing trend of green consumption. It also helps enterprises optimize their operational strategies while meeting environmental regulations, thereby achieving a balance between economic performance and environmental sustainability.

…”

Comment 18. Line 260: Is the "green supply chain" mentioned in Table 1 the "low-carbon supply chain" that the article aims to study? Please confirm this.

Response: Thank you for your insightful comment. We have confirmed that the term “green supply chain” is appropriately stated in Table 1 and added explanatory content at the beginning of Sub-section 2.1, which is titled “Green supply chain.” The following is the relevant part of the revised manuscript on page 5.

“…The studies on green supply chain contain various aspects, such as green procurement, green logistics, low-carbon products and more. This work specifically focuses on green investment strategies, and thus, reviews the literature related to low-carbon supply chains. …”

We hope these revisions address your concern effectively and help clarify the context of our study.

Comment 19: Line 290: Model assumptions need to be made before constructing and solving the model. Please complete this section.

Response: We thank the reviewer for the constructive suggestion. In response, we have revised the model construction section (around Line 290) to clearly state the key assumptions of the study. These include the structure of the dual-channel supply chain, consumer behavior characteristics, the sequence of decision-making, and the influence of product pricing, green level, and blockchain adoption on demand. This addition ensures that the model is well-grounded in a set of explicit and reasonable assumptions before proceeding to formulation and analysis.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…This section begins by stating the key assumptions underlying the model. (1) The supply chain consists of a manufacturer and an e-retailer, where the manufacturer sells products both through a direct online channel and via the e-retailer. (2) Consumers are heterogeneous in their preferences and show varying degrees of sensitivity to price, product greenness, and blockchain-based information transparency. (3) The manufacturer can choose whether to invest in low-carbon technologies, which affects the product’s green level and production cost. (4) The e-retailer decides whether to adopt blockchain technology to enhance consumer trust in product information. (5) Demand in each channel depends on retail prices, product green level (if any), blockchain adoption, and channel market share. (6) The manufacturer acts as the Stackelberg leader and moves first, making decisions on direct sales price and green level (if any), followed by the e-retailer who sets the retail price. These assumptions form the foundation of the strategic interactions modeled under the NN, LN, and LB strategy combinations.…”

Comment 20: Line 299: Is the manufacturer's strategic choice to adopt low-carbon technology? Is this related to green investment strategies? Please explain this point.

Response: We thank the reviewer for the thoughtful question. In response, we have clarified in the revised manuscript that the manufacturer’s strategic choice to adopt low-carbon technology is indeed equivalent to undertaking a green investment strategy. Specifically, the adoption of low-carbon technology represents an investment aimed at improving the product’s environmental performance by reducing carbon emissions during production. This clarification has been added to the relevant sentence around Line 299 to avoid ambiguity and better align the terminology with the study’s focus on green investment decisions.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…

4.1 The strategy combination NN

The strategy combination NN is first considered as the benchmark case, where the manufacturer does not engage in green investment, i.e., does not adopt low-carbon technology, and the e-retailer does not implement blockchain technology. The results under the other two strategy combinations are compared against this baseline to examine the impacts of green investment and blockchain adoption. …”

Comment 21: Line 304: Please prove the rationality of the demand function setting.

Response: We thank the reviewer for this important comment. In this study, we adopt a linear demand function, which is widely used in the supply chain and operations management literature due to its analytical tractability and ability to capture key economic relationships. The linear form allows us to clearly characterize how retail prices, product green levels, and blockchain adoption influence demand while maintaining mathematical manageability in solving the Stackelberg game model. This specification is consistent with prior studies such as Chen et al. (2023), Zhu et al. (2024), and Gu et al. (2025), and thus provides a rational and well-established basis for analysis. We have added this justification near Line 304 in the revised manuscript.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…The linear demand structure is consistent with prior studies such as Chen et al. (2023), Zhu et al. (2024), and Gu et al. (2025), and thus provides a rational and well-established basis for analysis.…”

Comment 22: Line 310: There are incorrect references, please correct them.

Response: We thank the reviewer for pointing out the issue. The incorrect references were due to system compatibility problems that caused some citation links to be unrecognized during submission. We have carefully checked and corrected the formatting of all references around Line 310 in the revised manuscript to ensure proper citation display and consistency.

Comment 23: Line 339: How is set in Equation 8? Please prove the rationality of this setting.

Response: We appreciate the reviewer’s valuable comment. The secondary term in the cost function related to low-carbon technology in Equation (8) follows a quadratic form, which is commonly adopted in the literature to capture the increasing marginal cost associated with higher levels of green investment. This functional form reflects that as the manufacturer increases the green level, the incremental cost rises at an increasing rate, consistent with findings in related studies such as Liu and Ma (2022) and Huang et al. (2020). This approach provides a realistic and tractable representation of the cost structure for low-carbon technology adoption. We have added this justification in the revised manuscript for clarity.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“… This functional form reflects that as the manufacturer increases the green level, the incremental cost rises at an increasing rate, consistent with findings in related studies such as Liu and Ma (2022) and Huang et al. (2020).…”

Comment 24: Line 426: "In order to consider blockchain and low-carbon technology," is low-carbon technology a green investment strategy? Is this related to the research topic of the article? Please carefully clarify the problems addressed in this study.

Response: We thank the reviewer for this important question. We clarify that low-carbon technology adoption by the manufacturer is indeed a form of green investment strategy, which lies at the core of our research topic. The study investigates how the manufacturer’s green investment decisions, i.e., whether to adopt low-carbon technologies, interact strategically with the e-retailer’s blockchain adoption to influence pricing and demand in a dual-channel supply chain. To address the reviewer’s concern, we have explicitly clarified this relationship in the revised introduction and clearly defined the scope and problems addressed by this study.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“... In this study, the low-carbon attribute is modeled through the manufacturer's green level decision, which represents the extent to which carbon emissions are reduced during production via green technologies or environmentally friendly materials. A higher green level reflects a more substantial reduction in carbon emissions, aligning with the low-carbon supply chain objectives. …”

Comment 25: Lines 503-504: Please justify the selection of parameter values for this study. What do these parameters mean? In what units are they given? Please complete all of this.

Response: We appreciate the reviewer’s insightful comment. The parameter values used in our numerical studies are selected based on data from a fashion product retailer in Shenyang, China, and are normalized to ensure analytical tractability and meaningful interpretation. For instance, the market potential parameter reflects the maximum possible demand under ideal conditions, while the market share parameter captures the division of sales channels. Other parameters are chosen to represent realistic market scenarios and maintain consistency with previous research. All parameters are dimensionless or appropriately scaled for comparative analysis. We have added detailed explanations of the parameter meanings, their justification, and unit assumptions in the revised manuscript to enhance clarity and transparency.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…

Numerical studies

Numerical analyses are performed to investigate the effects of , , and on the supply chain members’ profits, offering managerial insights into strategic decisions. Data from a fashion product retailer in Shenyang, China, is used to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed models. However, due to business confidentiality, the true market data are not used, but instead, reasonable values are assigned to the associated parameters for the computational experiments. The parameter values used in the numerical analysis are summarized as follows. The market potential represents the maximum potential demand under ideal conditions, and the market share of the direct sales channel . The competition intensity of price reflects moderate substitutability between the two channels. The wholesale price . The blockchain cost . The green trust coefficient of consumer , and the low-carbon preference of consumer . All parameters are dimensionless or normalized for the purpose of comparative and sensitivity analysis. Unless otherwise specified, the parameter values used in the experiments are set as the default for the analysis.

…”

Comment 26. Line 576: This section does not belong to the conclusion of this study. Please correct this part of the content.

Response: Thank you for your comment and suggestion. We revised the Conclusions. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…

Conclusions

This study investigates the feasibility of the supplier investing in green investment strategies and the retailer investing in blockchain technology. To analyze the strategic interactions, Stackelberg game models are developed under the strategy combinations NN, LN, and LB. Existing studies have explored the application of blockchain technology in low-carbon supply chains and revealed several important findings: (1) The application of blockchain technology can improve the economic profits of the supply chain system. (2) Retailer blockchain adoption demonstrates significant advantages over government blockchain adoption and manufacturer blockchain adoption. (3) Manufacturers and retailers are motivated to embrace blockchain when the associated costs remain below thresholds. However, the interaction between blockchain technology and low-carbon transition strategies is understudied. This work found that green investment strategy and blockchain technology are not always optimal for supply chain members. In this section, research fundings, managerial insights and future research are summarized.

7.1 Research findings

The main findings of this work are summarized in the following.

(2) The wholesale price has no effect on the optimal strategy combination.

(5) Under the strategy combinations LN and LB, the selling prices and the product green levels increase as consumer consumers’ low-carbon preference increases. When the wholesale price is high, the selling prices and product green levels under strategy combination LB is higher than those under the strategy combination LN. Among all strategy combinations, the selling prices under strategy NN are the lowest.

7.2 Managerial insights

Managerial insights are summarized as follows.

(1) The manufacturer should adopt the green investment strategy and the e-retailer should adopt the blockchain technology if the consumer green trust coefficient is below, moderate or slightly above the moderate level, if the market share of a channel is neither extremely high nor low, or if consumers exhibit a high level of low-carbon preference.

(2) When consumer low-carbon preference is weak, the strategy combination NN is optimal for the supply chain members.

(3) Under the technology combination LN, the e-retailer should take measures such as providing third-party certifications, and offering detailed product environmental information to increase the consumers’ green trust , thus increasing its own and the manufacturer’s profits.

(4) When the manufacturer conducts a green investment strategy, the e-retailer should refrain from using blockchain technology if its market share is either very high or very low, if consumers highly trust the green attributes of products sold through the e-retailer, or if the consumers’ low-carbon preference is at a low to medium level.

(5) When the manufacturer conducts the green investment, the supply chain members should take measures to strengthen consumer low-carbon preference.

7.3 Future research

Future research may explore carbon emissions policies such as limited total carbon emissions, carbon taxation, and cap-and-trade, while integrating all three dimensions of sustainability (economic, environmental, and social) into supply chain management. It is also worthwhile to explore the design of uncertain supply chain networks, and to explore appropriate approaches for coping with uncertainties. Effective inventory management is a challenging future task and deserves further investigation. Another promising research direction is to discuss whether the supply chain members should provide carbon credit to consumers. In addition, it is valuable to discuss the impact of consumers’ fairness concerns on the decisions of supply chain participants. In particular, applying the developed strategies to real-world problems is a valuable research direction.

…”

Comment 27. Line 594: This section deserves a subheading to make the content look more intuitive.

Response: Thank you for your comment and suggestion. We divided Section 7 into three subsections, i.e., 7.1 Research findings, 7.2 Managerial insights and 7.3 Future research.

Comment 28. Line 604: Does the format of the references comply with the requirements of the journal? Please compare and correct carefully.

Response: Thanks you very much for spotting out these errors. Following your help suggestion, we read the paper carefully, corrected all citation formats accordingly. Please refer to the revised manuscript for more details. We truly appreciate your meticulous reading of the paper. Thank you once again for your valuable insight.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Does blockchain have the potential to transform the art industry through improved information sharing? The paper should provide more justification or clarification on this point.

Line 302: Why is the demand assumed to be linear? More practical justification is needed. Mathematically, I understand that it facilitates achieving a closed-form solution.

Line 332: Why is the demand framework assumed to be linear? More practical justification is required. Mathematically, I understand that it helps achieve a closed-form solution.

Line 337: The assumption appears to be valid, but the authors need to briefly explain why it leads to non-trivial results.

Line 89 and beyond: Similar to the work mentioned in Line 89, does the number of stages or periods affect the model?

Formula 5 (before Line 389): It seems the blockchain cost (C) is presented as a fixed cost throughout the model. Shouldn’t it be a marginal cost based on the number of sales or distributions? This could be misinterpreted, especially since the references in Lines 389, 390, and 391 are missing.

Conclusion: The conclusion section must be significantly improved. The results should be compared or benchmarked with previous work.

Author Response

Comment 1. Does blockchain have the potential to transform the art industry through improved information sharing? The paper should provide more justification or clarification on this point.

Response: Thank you for your constructive suggestion. This study primarily focuses on a generalized supply chain rather than the supply chain of a specific product. Accordingly, the introduction of blockchain technology is also applied to generalized products. Blockchain refers to a technology that enables consumers to trace product-related information throughout various stages of the supply chain. If artworks in the art industry are also regarded as products produced by enterprises, then blockchain can likewise improve information-sharing related to artworks. However, the information-sharing in the context of artworks is a distinct and meaningful research topic in its own right. We appreciate your valuable insight and will consider this as a potential direction for future research.

Comment 2: Line 302: Why is the demand assumed to be linear? More practical justification is needed. Mathematically, I understand that it facilitates achieving a closed-form solution.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

Comment 3: Line 332: Why is the demand framework assumed to be linear? More practical justification is required. Mathematically, I understand that it helps achieve a closed-form solution.

Response: Thank you for your constructive suggestion. In this study, we adopt a linear demand function, which is widely used in the supply chain and operations management literature due to its analytical tractability and ability to capture key economic relationships. The linear form allows us to clearly characterize how retail prices, product green levels, and blockchain adoption influence demand while maintaining mathematical manageability in solving the Stackelberg game model. This specification is consistent with prior studies such as Chen et al. (2023), Zhu et al. (2024), and Gu et al. (2025), and thus provides a rational and well-established basis for analysis.

Comment 4: Line 337: The assumption appears to be valid, but the authors need to briefly explain why it leads to non-trivial results.

Response: We thank the reviewer for the helpful comment. In response, we have clarified in the manuscript that the condition is imposed to ensure the concavity of the profit function with respect to the decision variables, which guarantees the existence of an interior maximum and leads to non-trivial, analytically meaningful equilibrium solutions. This assumption avoids degenerate cases such as corner solutions or unbounded outcomes, thereby enabling economically relevant analysis. The explanation has been added near Line 337 in the revised manuscript.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…To avoid trivial or degenerate results and to ensure that the profit function remains concave in the decision variables, this work assumes that , which guarantees the existence of a unique and interior optimal solution.

…”

Comment 5. Line 89 and beyond: Similar to the work mentioned in Line 89, does the number of stages or periods affect the model?

Response: Thank you for your comment. Chen et al. (2023) developed a three-stage game model consisting of a supplier, a third-party logistics service provider (TPLSP) and a retailer. First, the TPLSP takes its own profit maximization as the fundamental goal and determines the unit service price of fresh product, carbon emission reduction level , and freshness preservation effort level , which constitutes the first stage of the game; then, the supplier maximizes its own profit as the goal on the basis of TPLSP decision-making, determining the unit wholesale price of fresh products, which constitutes the second stage; finally, the retailer decides to maximize its profits under the given , , , and .

Different from Chen et al. (2023), this work develops a two-stage game model consists of a supplier and a retailer. Under the strategy combination NN, first, the supplier takes its own profit maximization as the fundamental goal and determines its direct sales price , which constitutes the first stage of the game; then, the retailer maximizes its own profit as the goal on the basis of supplier decision-making, determining its retail price , which constitutes the second stage.

Under the strategy combination LN, first, the supplier takes its own profit maximization as the fundamental goal and determines its direct sales price and the green level of low-carbon products , which constitutes the first stage of the game; then, the retailer maximizes its own profit as the goal on the basis of supplier decision-making, determining its retail price , which constitutes the second stage.

Under the strategy combination LB, first, the supplier takes its own profit maximization as the fundamental goal and determines its direct sales price and the green level of low-carbon products , which constitutes the first stage of the game; then, the retailer maximizes its own profit as the goal on the basis of supplier decision-making, determining its retail price , which constitutes the second stage.

In the Stackelberg game framework, the follower’s decisions depend on the leader’s prior decisions. Profit functions are established separately for each supply chain member. Backward induction is used to derive optimal decisions. Therefore, changes in the number of stages or periods not only affect the model but also affect the optimal decisions, thereby influencing the equilibrium outcomes of the supply chain.

Comment 6: Formula 5 (before Line 389): It seems the blockchain cost (C) is presented as a fixed cost throughout the model. Shouldn’t it be a marginal cost based on the number of sales or distributions? This could be misinterpreted, especially since the references in Lines 389, 390, and 391 are missing.

Response: We thank the reviewer for this important observation. In our model, the blockchain cost (denoted as C) is treated as a fixed cost associated with the adoption and operation of the technology, independent of the sales volume. This modeling choice reflects scenarios where blockchain involves infrastructure setup, verification protocols, and system maintenance that incur consistent operational costs once adopted, i.e., regardless of the exact number of units sold. However, we acknowledge that in practice, blockchain costs can also exhibit variable components depending on transaction volume or data processing requirements. To avoid confusion, we have clarified this modeling assumption in the revised manuscript before Formula (5) and included supporting references where relevant.

Please refer to the revised manuscript for the details. The following is the revised portion of the manuscript.

“…In (14), the blockchain cost is assumed to be a fixed cost incurred by the e-retailer upon choosing to implement blockchain technology. This reflects the nature of blockchain adoption as an infrastructure-level investment, which includes costs related to system development, maintenance, and verification, and does not vary with the number of units sold. Such a fixed-cost formulation is consistent with prior studies (Chen et al., 2023; Gu et al., 2025; Tian and Bai, 2025), where blockchain is treated as a technological commitment rather than a per-unit cost. This assumption simplifies the analysis while capturing the strategic trade-off associated with technology adoption.…”

Comment 7. Conclusion: The conclusion section must be significantly improved. The results should be compared or benchmarked with previous work.

Response: Thank you for your valuable comment and suggestion. We revised the conclusion by adding comprehensive comparisons with previous studies. The corresponding descriptions quoted from the revised manuscript are as follows.

“…Existing studies have explored the application of blockchain technology in low-carbon supply chains and revealed several important findings: (1) The application of blockchain technology can improve the economic profits of the supply chain system. (2) Retailer blockchain adoption demonstrates significant advantages over government blockchain adoption and manufacturer blockchain adoption. (3) Manufacturers and retailers are motivated to embrace blockchain when the associated costs remain below thresholds. However, the interaction between blockchain technology and low-carbon transition strategies is understudied. This work found that green investment strategy and blockchain technology are not always optimal for supply chain members. In this section, research fundings, managerial insights and future research are summarized. …”

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors have carefully revised the paper, but some issues still remain. The comments are as follows.

In the problem description section, please include a diagram to illustrate the model studied in the paper.
In Model (5), is the "E(.)" notation necessary? There is no randomness involved here, and it is not reflected in the proofs. Please double-check this, and carefully review other similar models in the paper.
Please carefully verify the proofs of each property. Some of the reasoning in the proofs is not entirely rigorous, and there are issues with the wording. Review them thoroughly.
The last sentence in the "Proof of Corollary 1" section is incorrect. Please correct it. Similar errors appear elsewhere in the paper and should also be fixed.

Author Response

Comment. The authors have carefully revised the paper, but some issues still remain. The comments are as follows.

Response: We sincerely thank the reviewer for the continued evaluation of our work and for acknowledging our efforts in revising the manuscript. We appreciate the additional comments provided and have carefully addressed each of them in the current revision. Further modifications have been made to improve the clarity, consistency, and theoretical soundness of the paper. We hope that these additional revisions satisfactorily resolve the remaining concerns and enhance the overall quality of the manuscript.

Comment 1. In the problem description section, please include a diagram to illustrate the model studied in the paper.

Response: Thanks for your helpful suggestion. Following your suggestion, we added a figure along with corresponding descriptions to further clarify the supply chain structures and the underlying logic of model presented in this work. The following is the relevant part of the revised manuscript on page 10.

“…Furthermore, consider the following three strategy combinations between the manufacturer and the e-retailer: (1) Neither the manufacturer nor the e-retailer adopts any technology, denoted as NN; (2) The manufacturer adopts low-carbon technology, while the e-ratiler does not use blockchain technology, denoted as LN; (3) The manufacturer adopts low-carbon technology, and the e-ratiler introduces blockchain technology, denoted as LB. Specifically, the supply chain structures and the above strategy combinations are shown in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1. Supply chain structures and strategy combinations

… ”

Comment 2. In Model (5), is the “E(.)” notation necessary? There is no randomness involved here, and it is not reflected in the proofs. Please double-check this, and carefully review other similar models in the paper.

Response: We thank the reviewer for pointing out this important issue. Upon careful review, we agree that the expectation operator “E(.)” in Model (5) is unnecessary, as there is no stochastic component involved in the model formulation or analysis. We have removed the expectation notation from Model (5) and checked the entire manuscript to ensure consistency and correctness in notation across all related expressions. We appreciate the reviewer’s attention to detail, which helped improve the precision and clarity of the manuscript.

Comment 3: Please carefully verify the proofs of each property. Some of the reasoning in the proofs is not entirely rigorous, and there are issues with the wording. Review them thoroughly.

Response: We sincerely thank the reviewer for the careful reading and valuable suggestion. In response, we have thoroughly reviewed and revised all proofs provided in the manuscript to ensure mathematical rigor, logical consistency, and clarity of presentation. Specifically, we have refined the wording of each step, clarified derivation processes, and corrected any ambiguities or imprecise expressions. These revisions strengthen the theoretical foundations of the study and improve the overall readability and reliability of the analytical results. We greatly appreciate the reviewer’s attention to detail, which has significantly contributed to the quality of the manuscript.

Comment 4: The last sentence in the “Proof of Corollary 1” section is incorrect. Please correct it. Similar errors appear elsewhere in the paper and should also be fixed.

Response: Thank you for your excellent comments. We carefully reviewed the “Proof of Corollary 1” section and corrected the last sentence. In addition, we have thoroughly checked the manuscript and revised similar errors throughout the paper to ensure consistency and accuracy. Please refer to the revised manuscript for more details.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Please add a column to Table 1 and briefly discuss the research method.

The conclusion still lacks a comparison or benchmark with other literature. If the authors believe their work is unique and that none of the results are comparable—which is a bold claim—they should explicitly state that, as of July 2025, no article has addressed Finding (e.g., 3).

Author Response

Comment 1. Please add a column to Table 1 and briefly discuss the research method.

Response: Thanks for your constructive suggestion. We added a column titled research method to Table 1 to provide additional clarify. The following is the relevant part of the revised manuscript on page 8.

“…

Table 1. The difference between this work and others

Related work	Green supply chain	Blockchain adoption	Dual-channel supply chain	Research method	Key contribution
Liao et al. (2025) [24]	√	√		Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Incorporated consumer privacy into the blockchain introduction strategy model for green supply chains.
Babaei et al. (2025) [26]	√	√		Mixed-integer linear programming model analysis	Investigated tracing strategy and blockchain adoption considering green products.
Lu et al. (2024) [29]		√	√	Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Examined blockchain introduction of an online e-retailer in dual-channel supply chains.
Tang et al. (2023) [14]	√			Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Proposed a carbon emission decision model with retailer fairness concern
Ren and Hu (2024) [17]	√			Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Studied the coordination of low-carbon supply chains considering the government subsidy.
Gu et al. (2025) [4]	√		√	Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Developed a blockchain adoption model for a low-carbon supply chain
Yang et al. (2024) [13]			√	Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Studied optimal online and offline pricing decisions considering data resource mining
Li et al. (2024) [30]	√		√	Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Examined manufacturer sales modes in a dual-channel platform supply chain considering the green product
Modark et al. (2024) [39]		√	√	Subgame-perfect equilibrium analysis	Studied blockchain adoption of dual-channel supply chains considering the fresh agricultural product
This work	√	√	√	Stackelberg game equilibrium analysis	Investigated manufacturer green level decisions and retailer blockchain adoption of dual-channel supply chains

…”

Comment 2. The conclusion still lacks a comparison or benchmark with other literature. If the authors believe their work is unique and that none of the results are comparable—which is a bold claim—they should explicitly state that, as of July 2025, no article has addressed Finding (e.g., 3).

Response: Thank you for your excellent comments and suggestions. We agree that situating our findings within the existing literature can better clarify the novelty and contribution of our work. We carefully reviewed the relevant literature and found that, as of July 2025, no article has thoroughly explored the interaction between blockchain technology and low-carbon transition strategies. Existing research primarily examines the adoption of blockchain technology from the perspective of blockchain operation and construction costs, as well as firm-specific characteristics [4][7]. Gu et al. (2025) focused on manufacturers undergoing a low-carbon transition, producing both low-carbon and ordinary products, arguing that blockchain implementation benefits both manufacturers and retailers when the associated cost remains below a certain threshold [4]. Zhu et al. (2024) considered two categories of firms, superior brand firms and inferior brand firms. They found that blockchain adoption benefits superior brand firms when research and development (R&D) difficulty is low and consumer trust in low-carbon products is high, or when R&D difficulty is high but consumers’ low carbon preferences and brand awareness are high. For inferior brands, blockchain enhances profits when R&D difficulty is low with high consumer trust, or when R&D difficulty is high but brand awareness is weak [7]. In contrast to these studies, this work is among the first to investigate the interaction between blockchain technology and low-carbon transition strategies. This work finds that neither green investment nor blockchain adoption is universally optimal for supply chain members. Instead, their effectiveness is jointly influenced by consumers’ low-carbon preferences, consumer trust in the green attributes of products, and the market shares of supply chain members. Specifically, this work presents two key findings that differ from existing literature. First, the strategy combination LB yields optimal profits for both supply chain members when consumer trust in green attributes is below or slightly above a moderate level. Second, when the manufacturer adopts a green investment strategy, the e-retailer should refrain from implementing blockchain technology if its market share is either very high or very low.

We presented the above comparison results in Section 7 of the revised manuscript. Please refer to that section for more details.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

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