The Hartman Report on Sustainability: Understanding the Consumer Perspective

With global warming just one of several environmentally charged topics hotly debated in all manner of media, the focus of what needs to be done is largely centered on companies and businesses. Doesn' t it stand to reason, however, that if environmental marketing is to succeed the consumer' s voice should enter into the dialogue?

The Hartman Report on Sustainability: Understanding the Consumer Perspective is the first major integrated quantitative and qualitative study to find out how consumers feel about a world struggling to live in balance today for the benefit of future generations.

While the term "sustainability" strikes a chord with only the most "green" of consumers, this should not fool us into believing that sustainability-related issues are irrelevant to everyone else. Quite the opposite is true. In fact, there are strong indications that a host of issues related to sustainability have become mainstream concerns to masses of American consumers.

The report, inspired by over decade-long studies of consumers engaged in living health and wellness lifestyles, examines the understanding consumers have of "sustainability" and how issues related to sustainability become manifest (or not) in the context of everyday life and in relation to shopping and consumption practices.

What to Expect

Expect the unexpected: Few consumers have deep or extensive knowledge of expert, policy, or corporate discourses related to sustainability and sustainable development. In fact, relatively few consumers have any familiarity at all with the terms "sustainability" and "sustainable development." At the same time, however, we found that most consumers do (93%), in fact, operate in everyday life with varying degrees of what we have come to think of as "sustainability consciousness."

Our research clearly reveals that a cultural shift is taking place in terms of consumer awareness, acceptance and practices that relate to sustainability. Specifically, this report provides detailed sociological exploration of how perceived risks from air, water, sun and food vectors translates into both personal behavior as well as larger notions of what are sustainable and environmental practices, products and services.

The Hartman Report on Sustainability: Understanding the Consumer Perspective is a deep dive into how cultural behaviors are evolving in a variety of spheres, including but not limited to recycling, household cleaning, gardening and the selection of apparel and household objects and how these preferences translate along the lines of so-called "sustainable" choices.

Given the scope and complexity of consumer behavior, anyone marketing or providing services from a platform of eco-consciousness should consider the findings presented in Sustainability from a Consumer Perspective.

• CH I provides the theory behind sustainability looking at whether or not "sustainability" is a household word and the key triggers to sustainability consciousness.
• CH II introduces the World of Sustainability, the segment profiles and dimensions of participation.
• CH III examines risk awareness, triggers of risk perception and evolution of sustainability consciousness.
• CH IV discusses the search for solutions within the context of everyday life at work and at home and delves into the power the consumer wields (or not).
• CH V looks at the various levels of how consumers react to world problems from active to passive engagement.
• CH VI paints a portrait of the largest segment of the population, mid-level consumers, and examines their understanding of sustainability issues and behaviors.
• CH VII explores consumers' view of corporate citizenship detailing characteristics associated with environment-friendly companies, the importance of business practices in consumers' purchasing decisions, consumer reactions to companies with sustainable values and the companies perceived to be socially responsible.
• CH VIII explores how sustainability intersects with health and wellness, leading to broader notions of quality.
• CH IX provides reflections on opportunities and recommendations for companies.

Quantitative National Survey

This report presents results from an online survey of 1,606 US consumers conducted in January 2007 to understand consumer attitudes and behaviors related to sustainability practices and products. Consumers were surveyed to get a complete picture of the current state of sustainability attitudes and practices in the US. Methodological details of how the data were collected and how key measures were developed are provided here. The sampling error for the full sample of 1,606 respondents is less than �}2.5 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.

Sampling Frame

The sample for this study was drawn from a panel of adult US consumers with online (i.e., Internet) access. Therefore, the population sampled is a subset of the national population of the US. Over the years, the population of Internet users has grown and extended to households from every walk of life and in every region of the world. Nowhere is this expansion more complete than in the US. As a result, online samples for the US are generally considered to be nationally representative of the national population.24 The sample for this study was designed to provide good representation of the US population according to geographic area, age, gender, race and income. Although the sample provides full coverage of these characteristics, sample weights were developed to adjust for small departures from current US Census estimates of the population.

Segmenting Sustainability Consumers

We have divided the World of Sustainability into three consumer segments defined by their level of participation in the World. The construction of these segments made use of several pieces of data regarding: attention to information about Sustainability, attitudes toward Sustainability, price sensitivity, and reasons for participation in the World of Sustainability. The procedure for classifying respondents according to these three Sustainability consumer segments was a two-step process. The first step involved constructing summary measures corresponding to key attitudes and behaviors and the second step used these summary measures to identify the three segments.

• 1. How often are your purchasing decisions based upon your concerns for issues such as the environment and social well-being? (Rarely, Sometimes, or Usually);
• 2. If the store(s) you usually shop for food carried sustainability products at 10% higher prices than products made with other methods, how likely would you be to try such products? (Not at all likely, Hardly likely, Somewhat likely, or Very likely).

For this study, we defined such “Outside consumers” as those who (according to their survey responses) “rarely” base their purchasing decisions upon their concerns for issues such as the environment and social well-being AND fail to do so because (at least in part) “I' m not really concerned.” We also identified as Outsiders two (2) additional respondents who selected “I don' t think there are significant problems facing the world at this time” to the question “Thinking about the major problems facing the world, which of the following most closely resembles your perspective?”