Abstract
The wine industry has faced various environmental and social challenges. On the demand side, consumer demand for sustainable wines has been increasing but, to date, it is unknown whether consumers perceive wine companies’ efforts to obtain sustainable development (SD) certifications and labels as being valuable or how they differentiate them. On the supply side, sustainable wine production is increasing but producers report a lack of information to engage and select their SD strategy. This article uses a logistic regression and an artificial neural network model to show how French consumers differentiate and value different SD labels (Organic, Biodynamic, Sustainable, Fairtrade, Natural). Results show that consumers’ willingness to buy and willingness to pay are influenced by the importance each consumer gives to the certification. For all other drivers, consumers differentiate between labels, highlighting the importance of comparison between and knowledge about each of them, thereby aiding producers in choosing an appropriate marketing strategy.
Highlights
The French wine industry dates back to ancient times and holds an important place in the French economy, representing the 2nd largest net trade surplus and creating numerous jobs in rural regions (Alonso Ugaglia et al, 2019; Cardebat, 2017; Porter and Takeuchi, 2013)
Respondents articulate a high importance of the Place of Origin (5.78 on a 1-7 scale), an above average importance of Sustainable development (SD) certifications in general (3.99) and, interestingly, lower importance of expert ratings (2.87). 94% of the respondents had heard of and 82% had bought Organic wine previously, while the numbers are lower for all other certifications: Biodynamic (67%/49%), Fairtrade (55%/12%), Natural (58%/33%) and Sustainable (34%/15%)
These results suggest that the probability to buy a certified wine is significantly enhanced by the “importance” the consumer attaches to a label and ranges from a higher probability of 2.31 for Organic up to 3.24 times for Sustainable wines which is in line with general household theory, as wine consumers seem to buy wine according to their respective preferences (Varian, 2010)
Summary
The French wine industry dates back to ancient times and holds an important place in the French economy, representing the 2nd largest net trade surplus and creating numerous jobs in rural regions (Alonso Ugaglia et al, 2019; Cardebat, 2017; Porter and Takeuchi, 2013). The wine industry is under considerable pressure from regulators to evaluate, reduce, and report its environmental and social impacts (Christ and Burritt, 2013), and to incorporate sustainability into its management practices. The attributes of a wine, whether ethical, social or environmental, are not verifiable by consumers before purchase, or even after purchase and consumption in the case of sustainability attributes. Must adopt a symbol on the bottle to solve this asymmetric information attribute This symbol, SD certification or label, attests the compliance of the wine with a certain norm or a standard (Hoberika et al, 2013). It informs consumers and differentiates a wine from other wines (Giraud-Héraud and Hoffman, 2010). It has not been known whether consumers perceive wine companies’ efforts to obtain SD certifications and labels as being valuable (Barber et al, 2010) or how they differentiate
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