Customer experience influencing sustainable purchase intention: The case of flexible packaging

Abstract

As environmental sustainability is becoming an increasingly significant value among consumers, companies are required to produce more sustainable goods. The packaging industry, specifically, is highly dependent on consumer perceptions, as consumers choose more sustainable alternatives. This phenomenon of sustainable purchase intentions can be studied with customer experience and it’s five dimensions – sensory, cognitive, affective, social, and behavioral. In addition to the experiential view, there are underlying personal influences, consumer contingencies, that may influence the experience and purchase intention. The objective of this study is to find out how customer experience influences consumers’ purchase intention in the case of sustainable flexible packaging. The three research bases are: (1) What do consumers experience as sustainable in packaging? (2) How do the dimensions of customer experience influence sustainable purchase intention? (3) How does customer experience influence the path from consumer contingencies to sustainable purchase intention? The research follows an abductive design. The case of wood fiber -based flexible packaging is selected, because of its sustainable nature and lack of research in the context of sustainability. Preliminary interviews are conducted in order to achieve a comprehensive view on the case packaging, company, and industry. After this, an a priori framework is formed based on literature and the preliminary interviews. To generate answers to the research questions, consumer interviews are conducted in focus groups. The consumer data is analysed using a qualitative data analysis software. The data on consumer contingencies is further analysed using a clustering method. The findings show that consumers experience sustainable packaging in relation to their own variables, as well as packaging attributes. The packaging attributes that increase perceived sustainability are experienced through the sensory, cognitive, and affective dimensions and include brown colour, papery feel, and unambiguous material. The consumer variables relating to behavioral and social experience include sorting and purchasing habits, and response to social factors. All five experience dimensions influence the purchase intention of sustainable packaging. The cognitive dimension is the most prominent, as it’s the most frequent to influence purchase intention. This influence is mostly positive, as it most often leads to choosing the sustainable alternative. The sensory and affective dimensions also show mostly positive influences. The social and behavioral dimensions also show negative influences on sustainable purchase intention. The cluster analysis compiles three distinct contingency clusters, that have varying significance of sustainability ingrained in their contingences. The findings show that consumers with more sustainability present in their contingencies tend to experience cognitively, and choose more sustainable alternatives. With the consumers that show a smaller significance of sustainability in their contingencies, the experience tends to be more diverse including different dimensions, and the choices more split between sustainable and non-sustainable alternatives. This research produces academic contributions broadening existing literature. The literature on customer experience is reinforced and connected to consumer view and sustainability. The relationship on customer experience and customer value is also clarified. In addition, the literature on sustainable packaging is reinforced and connected to customer experience. The managerial contributions support the product development of sustainable packaging. Based on the findings, implications for future research include further testing the a priori framework, as well as further researching consumer contingencies and customer experience dimensions in different contexts.