Consumers’ Attitudes for Sustainable Mountain Cheese

Abstract

The shift towards more sustainable consumptions and habits have had tangible impacts on food markets, which have accepted this challenge by offering a variety of certification systems to pull consumers aside. However, food purchasing choices are also guided by ethical, environmental and cultural motivations, functioning as drivers of food acquiring. This study aimed at assessing the influence of consumers’ attitudes in purchasing an Alpine cheese labelled with a food sustainability logo, as the mountain product brand, following a two-step approach. We estimated the consumers’ preferences for some sustainable labels by using Choice Experiments (CE), followed by a Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) approach to assess the influence of three attitudinal scales on the consumers’ behavior. The main results show the influence of green consumers’ values on the mountain product brand choice, and a strong relationship between green consumers’ and animal well-being values. In the conclusions, some policy indications are provided.

Reading Food Experiences from the Face: Effects of Familiarity and Branding of Soy Sauce on Facial Expressions and Video-Based RPPG Heart Rate

“…EmojiGrid scores. The positions of the scores on the EmojiGrid valence (X) and arousal (Y) axis were converted into numerical values (1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9)(10).…”

“…Brand equity combines perceived quality with factors such as brand loyalty, name awareness, and other associations that the consumer may have with the brand [3]. Obviously, the factors vary with the consumer's experience with the product and aid consumers in selecting prod-Foods 2021, 10, 1345 2 of 13 ucts that fit their attitudes [4,5]. Extrinsic variables may also exert direct effects on taste experiences [6,7].…”

How to Improve Food Quality in the Domestic Market: The Role of “Same Line Same Standard Same Quality”—Evidence from a Consumer Choice Experiment in China

“…Abundant studies have investigated consumer preferences for organic labels [33][34][35], finding that consumers generally believe that organic food is safer, healthier, and more environmentally friendly [36,37], and they are willing to pay a price premium for organic food [15,30,[38][39][40]. Certain studies compare consumer preferences and their willingness to pay for products with different organic certifications [14,41].…”

The Effect of Verbal and Iconic Messages in the Promotion of High-Quality Mountain Cheese: A Non-Hypothetical BDM Approach

“…Research by Sajuàn and Khliji [ 49 ] found that mountain beef is appreciated by a niche of consumers; however, the average consumer is only slightly willing to pay more for mountain products compared to conventional ones. More recently, Nam et al [ 50 ] and Mazzocchi et al [ 51 ] found higher willingness to pay for mountain milk and cheese respectively in consumers with higher awareness of animal welfare and agricultural sustainability issues. These results suggest that only specific clusters of consumers would pay more for this characteristic.…”

“…Thus, in a hypothetical scenario, they tend to underestimate the costs of their choices and/or overestimate their willingness to pay for high quality foods [ 56 , 57 , 58 , 59 ]. As a result, the real market premium price for high-quality mountain dairy products does not always compensate mountain farmers for the low productivity of grassland-based farms [ 51 , 60 ].…”