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Building sustainability into food products: How information about sustainable production affects acceptance of new food

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  • Klaus G. Grunert,
  • Esben Durhuus Lejsgaard
Klaus G. Grunert
MAPP Centre, Department of Management, Aarhus University
Esben Durhuus Lejsgaard
MAPP Centre, Department of Management, Aarhus University
DOI: https://doi.org/10.36253/rea-17017

Published 2026-09-18

Keywords

  • Meat,
  • New product development,
  • Consumer acceptance,
  • Sustainability,
  • Partial least squares

How to Cite

Grunert, K. G., & Lejsgaard, E. D. (2026). Building sustainability into food products: How information about sustainable production affects acceptance of new food. Italian Review of Agricultural Economics. https://doi.org/10.36253/rea-17017

Copyright (c) 2026 Klaus G. Grunert, Esben Durhuus Lejsgaard

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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Abstract

Consumers are interested in more sustainably produced food products, but sustainability can be incorporated into and communicated in several ways. It is therefore imperative to understand how information about aspects of sustainable production affects consumer acceptance of potential new products before making major investments in revised production systems. Concept tests serve as an early warning indicator in the process of developing new products. To investigate ways in which sustainability elements can be built into food product concepts that will appeal to consumers, we employ an approach to concept testing that builds on research on consumer quality perception. This provides a way of testing expected acceptance of new products and provides evidence on how elements of the concept affect the perception of expected quality and, in turn, overall liking and purchase intention. We apply the methodology to test new pork and chicken product concepts that include sustainability-related messaging. The results indicate that some sustainability elements favour product acceptance, partially mediated by perceived quality and perceived sustainability, but acceptance is equally related to packaging and more traditional aspects of food quality.

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