Timely or considered? Brand trust repair strategies and mechanism after greenwashing in China—from a legitimacy perspective

Abstract

As customers' green awareness improves, a growing number of Chinese companies are seeking to implement green management. However, in the implementation process, many green brands have engaged in greenwashing. After greenwashing, brand trust between green brands and their stakeholders can suffer a great deal of damage. A valid brand strategy and underlying mechanism should be identified to repair green brand trust after greenwashing. This study focuses on brand strategies and their underlying mechanisms adopted from institutional theory for green brand trust repair after greenwashing. Based on an organizational-level trust repair model, this study finds that companies should adopt a “timely-considered-timely” or “timely-considered-considered” brand strategy with three separate stages of brand trust repair, as opposed to other timely or considered brand strategy combinations, in order to achieve an optimal green brand trust repair effect. Moreover, this study also shows that the “considered-timely-timely” brand strategy achieves the worst green brand trust repair effect and that green brand legitimacy plays a significant mediating role in the brand trust repair process. These findings enrich the theories of brand management, green marketing, and trust repair and offer important managerial implications to help enterprises repair damaged trust.