Chapter 16- Social Responsibility and Sustainability

Marketers face the following five barriers to encouraging sustainable consumer behavior:

1. lack of awareness and knowledge 2. negative perceptions 3. distrust 4. high prices 5. low availability

Legal Dimension

Marketers have a responsibility to understand and obey the laws and regulations of the communities in which they do business. They must follow local, state, and federal laws.

Ethical Dimension

The ethical challenges facing marketers come from many different places. Inevitably, they involve more gray areas than the legal dimension.

Sustainable Value Innovation

This strategy entails reshaping the industry through the creation of differential value for consumers. It involves making contributions to society in the form of both reduced costs and reduced environmental impact.

Eco-Efficiency

This strategy involves identifying environmentally friendly practices that also create cost savings and drive efficiencies throughout the organization.

Sustainability

a commitment to a lifestyle that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.

Life-cycle assessment

a technique used to assess environmental impacts associated with all the stages of producing and delivering a firm's products.

Environmental regulations

are the laws designed to protect the natural environment against undue harm by individuals and organizations.

Ethics

are the moral standards expected by a society.

Beyond-Compliance Leadership

focus on communicating to stakeholders the company's attempts to go beyond others in adopting environmentally friendly practices. Marketers who select this strategy want to show customers that the company does more than the competition to implement an environmental strategy.

Eco-Branding

focuses on creating a credible green brand. For this strategy to be effective, consumers must recognize a noticeable benefit from their purchase.

Stakeholder responsibility

focuses on the obligations an organization has to its stakeholders, those who can affect or are affected by a firm's actions. Stakeholder responsibility is the driving consideration across the four dimensions of corporate social responsibility: economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic.

tactical greening

involves implementing limited change within a single area of the organization, such as purchasing or advertising.

green market

is a group of sustainability-oriented customers and the businesses that serve them.

Environmentalism

is a movement of citizens, government agencies, and the business community that advocates the preservation, restoration, and improvement of the natural environment.

Consumerism

is a movement, made up of citizens and government entities, that focuses on protecting consumers and promoting their interests.

Corporate Philanthropy

is the act of organizations voluntarily donating some of their profits or resources to charitable causes.

Corporate Volunteerism

is the policy or practice of employees volunteering their time or talents for charitable, educational, or other worthwhile activities, especially in the community.

Sustainable tourism

is the practice of recreational traveling in a way that maximizes the social and economic benefits to the local community and minimizes the negative impact on cultural heritage and the environment.

Sustainable marketing

is the process of creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers in a way that recognizes and incorporates the concept of sustainability.

Corporate Social Responsibility

refers to an organization's obligation to maximize its positive impact and minimize its negative impact on society

strategic greening

requires a holistic approach that integrates and coordinates all of the firm's activities on environmental issues across every functional area. It represents a fundamental shift in the way the firm markets its products.

Quasi-strategic greening

usually involves more substantive changes in marketing actions as well as broad-based coordination among non-marketing activities. For example, a firm might redesign its logo or overhaul a product's packaging to emphasize the firm's commitment to greenness.

Environmental Cost Leadership

Firms seeking a price premium for their environmentally friendly products often adopt an environmental cost leadership strategy. Green products sometimes cost more to produce than traditional products.

Economic Dimension

For-profit firms have a responsibility to their stakeholders to be profitable. Without profits, a business cannot survive. A failed business hurts employees, investors, and communities.

implementing a broad CSR focus

1. Good stakeholder management. Marketers should seek significant interaction with the stakeholders who influence the decisions and behavior of the company. 2. Good corporate leadership. The firm's leaders play a vital role in guiding their organization's business practices toward social responsibility. 3. Integration of CSR into corporate policy at all levels and in all divisions of the firm. CSR policies and procedures are most useful when they are written down, well understood, and endorsed by affected employees.