Do consumers care about companies’ efforts in greening supply chains? Analyzing the role of protected values and the halo effect in product evaluation

Abstract

Widespread efforts are being made to mitigate environmental degradation driven by human activities. From a supply chain management perspective, companies aim at improving their environmental and organizational performance along their supply chain simultaneously. Since consumers are the sources of manufacturing companies’ profitability, companies are interested in understanding the extent to which consumers care about their green practices. However, while some consumers would have a higher willingness to pay a premium (WPP) or purchase intention (PI) for environmentally differentiated products, others would not. Moreover, there is scant evidence regarding the integrated effects of intra- and inter-organizational green supply chain practices on green consumerism. Therefore, this study adopts two psychological approaches (i.e., protected values and halo effect) to describe this relationship based on two models that encompass mediation and moderation effects. Data were collected from 351 Colombian university students through a behavioral experiment with three product-based conditions, and the hypotheses were tested using two-instance repeated-measures linear regressions and non-parametric tests. The results indicate that perceived product performance mediates the effect of green supply chain practices on consumers’ WPP and PI (halo effect). Additionally, consumers’ moral orientation toward the environment (protected values) moderates the effects of green supply chain practices on consumers’ WPP, PI and perceived product performance. The study found that people who hold protected values evaluate products better not just for its green attributes, but because of their increased perception of the products’ performance. The contributions are centered on the role of psychological approaches in green supply chain studies to understand consumers’ preferences.