Configurators/Choiceboards: Uses, Benefits, and Analysis of Data

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Author(s): Paul D. Berger (Bentley University, USA), Richard C. Hanna (Northeastern University, USA), Scott D. Swain (Northeastern University, USA)and Bruce D. Weinberg (Bentley University, USA)
Copyright: 2010
Pages: 8
Source title: Encyclopedia of E-Business Development and Management in the Global Economy
Source Author(s)/Editor(s): In Lee (Western Illinois University, USA)
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-61520-611-7.ch042

Keywords: Business & Management / Business Science Reference / E-Business

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Abstract

This article discusses the uses and benefits of configurator/choiceboard systems, and how analysis of data from its use can be useful to the company having such a system. Dell and other companies have greatly improved, if not perfected, the art of product customization by using a system of choiceboards or configurators (used here as interchangeable terms) that allow consumers to customize their products. A popular term for what is being accomplished by the use of choiceboards is “mass customization,” a term that not long ago may have been thought of as an oxymoron. We always had “job shops” that produced to order for individual consumers or companies. However, relatively speaking, individual customization did not occur on a large-scale basis, and was quite distinct from what was called mass production, and surely, was not routinely available online even when there was first an “online.”

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