Economic experiments have been widely used to elicit individuals' evaluation for various commodities. Common elicitation methods include auction and posted price mechanisms. A field experiment is designed to compare willingness-to-pay (WTP) estimates between these two mechanisms. Despite both of these formats being theoretically incentive compatible and demand revealing, results from 115 adult consumers indicate that WTP estimates obtained from an auction are 32–39 percent smaller than those from a posted price mechanism. A comparison in statistical significance shows that auctions require a smaller sample size than posted price mechanisms in order to detect the same preference change. Nevertheless, the signs of marginal effects for different product characteristics are consistent in both mechanisms.

This research compared bids that consumers placed on non genetically modified (GM), organic, and conventional versions of food products in order to determine if the organic market well serves those seeking to avoid GM foods. Auction experiments using potato chips, tortilla chips, and milk chocolate were conducted with 79 subjects. Bids were modeled as a function of consumer demographics using a heteroskedastic tobit regression model. Results with the non-GM attribute nested into the organic characteristic showed that the latter's marginal effects were insignificant. This suggested the potential to further develop non-GM products for consumers not willing to pay extra for the remaining organic attributes.

Auction experiments are commonly used to determine consumers’ willingness to pay for various food items. While their non-hypothetical nature is a positive, market substitutes create a probable confounding of bids by field prices. This study examines the influence of field prices on bids for four foods in two versions by conducting auctions before and after large price increases in 2007. Results show that bids were capped at given field prices and were significantly higher in sessions conducted after store prices increased. Percentage premiums, however, were not significantly different across sessions, suggesting that effects of field prices could be reduced. Overall, researchers must be conscious of how field prices affect bids.

Auction experiments were used to examine demand and premium differences between organic, non-OM (genetically modified), and conventional versions for two pairs of fresh and processed foods. Results showed processed foods had greater substitutability among the versions than fresh products. Conventional versions were the least price sensitive, while non-OM versions were the most sensitive. Significant premium differences were found between fresh and processed foods for sweet com and tortilla chips, but not for potatoes and potato chips. Results from random effects models mirrored these findings. In general, the extent of premium differences between fresh and processed versions appears dependent on the food product.

We employed Vickrey auctions to generate willingness-to-pay (WTP) data forred meat traceability and related product characteristics with comparableexperimental auctions in the United States, Canada, the U.K., and Japan. Theresults show that subjects are willing to pay a nontrivial premium fortraceability, but the same subjects show even higher WTP fortraceability-provided characteristics like additional meat safety and humaneanimal treatment guarantees. The implication is that producers might be ableto implement traceable meat systems profitably by tailoring the verifiablecharacteristics of the product to consumer preferences.