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Green is fashionable but can fashion be green? : effectivenes of green branding strategies : social, persuasion and relationship on brand attitude : does brand credibility matter?

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GREEN is FASHIONABLE but can FASHION be GREEN?

Effectiveness of green branding strategies: social, persuasion

and relationship on brand attitude: does brand credibility

matter?

M

ASTER

T

HESIS

Zuzanna Skorupińska Student Number: 10864350 Supervisor: dr. Ester de Waal MSc: Persuasive Communication

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Abstract

An experimental study investigated the effect of three green branding strategies: social, persuasion and relationship on brand attitude. The social strategy relates to brands visible in social settings representing consumers’ self-expression to others. The persuasion strategy is used to provide consumers with the instrumental advantages of the brand. Lastly, a strategy depicting the brand as representing a specific identity which aims to match consumers’ characteristic, refers to the relationship strategy. Moreover, the credibility of the brand has been named an important factor in consumers’ evaluations of the brand. Therefore, brand credibility has been added to the model and its moderation effect was further assessed. A total of 101 respondents were recruited via convenience sampling method. The participants were randomly assigned to three of the following conditions: social branding strategy, relationship branding strategy or relationship branding strategy. Each condition was exposed to the

advertisements of a highly credible brand and a brand with low credibility. The findings show that consumers’ evaluations of a brand are higher when they perceived the brand as highly credible as compared to a brand with low credibility. However, consumers’ attitudes about the advertised brands did not differ between the three tested strategies. The implications of the results and the limitations of the study are further discussed.

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1

Introduction

Present consumption societies are currently confronted with a growing awareness of sustainability attributes of various products which is reflected in growth of general public in-terest in environmental development issues (Vermeir & Verbeke, 2007). Consequently, this interest growth may potentially have impact on consumers' evaluation of sustainable products and ultimately on consumers' purchase intentions and behaviours. These conscious consumers create thus demand for green products which led brands to introduce new items to match con-sumer environmental concerns (Ng, Butt, Khong, & Ong, 2014). Development of environ-mentally concerned campaigns and products also contributes positively to increasing levels of consumer awareness towards green branding and their willingness to pay the added “green” value (Hemantha, 2012; Lee, 2008). Polls' results collected in the United States, Europe and East Asia showed a significant increase in concerns about the environmental issues and the green products in general (Chang, 2011). Research has proved that consumers are indeed ac-tively seeking environmentally friendly items and are showing a willingness to pay for green features (Montoro, Luque, Fuentes & Canadas, 2006; Ong & Phau, 2007; Peattie & Crane, 2005). It can be then stated that by being a worldwide social phenomenon, green branding became fashionable part of a daily life of consumers.

Moreover, research has shown that this growing environmental awareness among sumers is strongly linked to lifestyle which inspired the fashion industry to introduce the con-cepts of sustainability and environmental concerns into their clothing, footwear and other fashion accessories (Connolly & Prothero, 2003; Sojin & Byoungho, 2014;. Hwang, Lee & Diddi, 2015). Organic fashion has been recently stated the second largest organic market in terms of sales (Maloney, Lee, Jackson, & Miller-Spillman, 2014). More and more brands, such as Nike, Gap, Levi’s or H&M have in the recent years begun to launch green lines of clothing and eco-friendly partner brands (Sung & Lee, 2011; Maloney et al., 2014).

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There-2 fore, concern about green issues has been particularly visible in the fashion industry which is seen as satisfying many human needs such as protection or status (Meyer, 2001; Ong & Phau, 2007). As fashion is used for self-expression and lifestyle, consumers' attitudes and motiva-tions are of particular importance and need to be understood and addressed by the advertising campaigns. In spite of incontestable importance of consumers’ belief system for advertising strategies, many companies in general disregard consumers' attitudes, beliefs, values and needs when developing green marketing strategies (Peattie & Crane, 2005). An illustrative example of this issue can be found in the green marketing developed by fashion brands such as Topshop or Marks and Spencer’s which communicated mainly the company’s corporate social responsibility rather than addressing consumers’ beliefs, needs or goals (Peattie & Crane, 2005; Hwang, Lee & Diddi, 2015). When developing an advertising strategy, con-structing a profile of the target consumer, understanding his buyer attitudes and their sources is crucial as it enables the innovative advertisement (Shrum, McCarty & Lowrey, 1995). It is thus suggested that one of challenges companies that offer green products are facing is to cate strcategies based on market research into consumers' motivations and behaviour with re-gard to green products.

The research into green fashion and pro-environmental apparel products remains scarce (Maloney, et al., 2014). The existing research has applied the social-psychological models analysing human behaviour mainly in the field of health communication (Duncan, Rivis, & Jordan, 2012; de Bruijn & Rhodes, 2011; Dunn, Mohr, Wilson, & Wittert, 2011). The research has further moved from health issues towards different conscious concerns such as environment, sustainability and fair trade (Arvola et al., 2008; De Pelsmacker & Janssens, 2007; Onwezen, Barteles, & Antonides, 2014). Despite this growing interest in environmental issues, researchers have most often focused on the organic food market. Therefore, this research is of scientific relevance as it represents an additional value to the current body of

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3 knowledge by analysing the environmental aspect of fashion brands and related consumers’ attitudes. Supplementary to the scientific value, the study also carries societal relevance by addressing green fashion which represents, as previously mentioned, the second largest organic market (Maloney, et al., 2014). With regards to the practical relevance, the study presents insights to practitioners about “green consumers”, which brands they prefer and why and how their opinions are influenced by advertising and its content.

The choice of appropriate strategy is essential for effective persuasive communication and it may vary depending on particular contexts and characteristics of target group (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). It has been widely acknowledged that consumers seek a range of var-ious benefits from brands and their products and they will thus respond differently to branding strategies communicating specific brand benefits (Khandelwal, & Bajpai, 2011; Orth,

McDaniel, Shellhammer, & Lopetcharat, 2004). Therefore this study will explore green ad-vertising in the fashion industry by analysing three different branding strategies: social, per-suasion and relationship and their effects on consumers' brand attitudes. Green branding fo-cuses on providing consumers with information about the environmental concerns and attrib-utes of the green products. Nonetheless, this information can be presented in various ways and each of the brand strategies discussed in the study has specific characteristics directed at par-ticular determinants which aim to achieve corresponding objectives. The social strategy was chosen for the purpose of this study as it is used to advertise brands that are related to social settings (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). More specifically, consumers aim to communicate something of themselves to others by using the brand which translates particularly well into the field of fashion. With the means of fashion consumers can communicate to others the so-cial group they belong to or the group they aspire to belong to. Brands have become an oppor-tunity for consumers’ self-expression, self-realisation and self-identity which is strongly visi-ble in fashion industry (Carroll, 2008). Additionally, sustainavisi-ble fashion connects the

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adver-4 tised brand not only with particular social groups but also with their specific goals related to social consequences, such as environmental concerns. Furthermore, persuasion strategy is designed to communicate the instrumental advantages of the brand (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). As argued by van den Putte and Dhondt (2005), comparisons stressing positive conse-quences of using the advertised brand are a typical technique used for the persuasion strategy. Therefore, in context of the current study, persuasion strategy can provide information about the environmental benefits of using the green, sustainable brand as opposed to

non-sustainable brand. Lastly, relationship strategy was selected for this study in the virtue of brand having a specific identity which matches consumers’ personality and thus represents the basis of their relationship with the brand (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). Aligned with the green branding in the fashion industry, this study employs relationship advertisement by ad-dressing consumers’ pro-environmental goals and values. The attainment of these personal goals is accomplished through use of the brand which in turn strengthens the relationship be-tween the brand and the consumer.

Additionally, as argued by Hartmann, Ibáñez and Sainz (2005) a well-developed green branding strategy can generate a more favourable evaluation of the brand. Therefore, the ef-fectiveness of the studied strategies is further measured in terms of consumers’ brand atti-tudes. Moreover, previous research has established that environmental concerns are perceived as more credible if claimed by green brands as compared to brands having a neutral stand on environmental issues (Ong & Phau 2007). It has been also noted that the more successful green advertisements are those that equally generate greater credibility, especially in the long term perspective (Davari & Strutton, 2014). To determine thus a strong green marketing strat-egy for a brand whose identity is not entirely green but which is willing and able to deliver green products represents a challenge for advertisers. Therefore the following question arises:

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5 Which of the three green branding strategies in the fashion industry: social, persuasion or relationship has the strongest effect on brand attitude and how is this effect moderated by brand credibility?

Theoretical Background Integrated Framework for Effective Communication

The following statement: “If one wants to advertise a certain product or brand to a certain target group, how can one choose the optimal strategy?” represents the central concern of advertising according to van den Putte (2005, p. 2400). Each product or brand requires a specific strategy to be advertised in order to communicate its objectives to consumers. In spite of sales being an ultimate goal of any advertisement, the latter is reached through the means of equally important, intermediate goals prerequisite for an effective and persuasive

advertising (van den Putte, 2008). Therefore, with the immensely fast growing competition among brands in various categories, the right strategy needs to be developed and chosen with precision as it is a crucial key to success. That precision can be achieved with a specific message which by addressing or targeting particular behavioural determinants allows the brand to position itself among the competitors. Previously mentioned intermediate advertising goals such as brand attitude, brand associations or relationship with the brand are tightly related to determinants of consumers' behaviour (van den Putte, 2008). Derived from the theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB, Ajzen, 1985; 1911), the Integrated Framework for Effective Communication (IFEC) takes into account both concepts and develops branding strategies related to them (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). Social-psychological models such as TPB or theory of Reasoned Action (Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980) aim to predict, explain and influence any human behaviour and are thus a source of inspiration and suitable basis for succeeding persuasion strategies. Nonetheless, these models have been criticised for the lack

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6 of precision as either two or more behavioural determinants are addressed by the same

message strategy or two or more strategies aim at the same behavioural determinant (van den Putte, 2008). Therefore, IFEC was developed in order to address that issue and to provide an exhaustive list of branding strategies, each relating to specific behavioural determinants and having distinctive objectives. Subsequently, the fundamental and overreaching aim of the IFEC model is to provide a wide range of various branding strategies in order to select the potentially most effective one. The choice is made based on the main purchase motives of consumers which should be matched by the strategy (van den Putte, 2008). Additionally, reasons behind consumer's purchases often represent consumers' salient needs the brand has to fulfil. As the type of the consumer needs varies over product categories or brands the most effective strategy depends on the particular context as well as on the relevant consumer need which can be functional, emotional, social or normative (van den Putte, 2009).

Branding strategies

Firstly, the persuasion strategy seeks to convince consumers that the advertised brand offers them relevant and important attributes (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005; Franzen, 1999). This strategy is thus used when advertisers aim to communicate the instrumental advantages of the brand to recipients of the message. Typically, advertising within the persuasion strategy takes form of a reasoned argument and can be realised through product demonstrations, user testimonials, comparative advertising all stressing the positive consequences of brand use (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). Therefore in this study it can be used to provide information about environmental benefits of using the green, sustainable fashion brand in comparison to a non-sustainable, non-green brand. Secondly, the relationship strategy is used by advertisers to stimulate a feeling, an emotional connection with the brand by building up a specific brand identity that creates a relationship with the consumer as a result of their matching

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7 personalities (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). The main aim of the relationship branding strategy is thus to develop interaction between the consumer and the advertisement. This aim can be achieved by emphasizing that consumer's personal goals can be attained by buying the brand (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). This research will activate the relationship with the brand by addressing the personal goals such as pro-environmental values and sustainability concerns within the fashion industry. Lastly, the social branding strategy was developed to be applied in product categories that are visible in social settings, i.e. people communicate something of themselves to others with the use of the brand (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). Therefore, the brand within the social strategy can be perceived as having a symbolic meaning to which the consumer can relate and associate with. This symbolic brand meaning consists largely of associations with certain types of users which can be defined by socio-economic personality, lifestyle characteristics (Franzen, 1999). Furthermore, these meaning represent expressive values for the consumers who use the brand to communicate the social group they belong or wish to belong or whose approval they want to gain (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). Consequently, the social strategy is of a great suitability and relevance to the field of fashion as it satisfies many human needs such as self-expression, certain culture, lifestyle or certain social status (Phau & Ong, 2007; Meyer, 2001). Advertising is predominantly visual and contains little product information due to its focus on embodiment of brand meanings and connection of the brand with specific social groups and their goals (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005).

Green branding and fashion industry

Green branding can be defined as an advertisement of environmentally sound and ecologically sustainable products which actively communicates the green brand attributes (Hartmann, 2005). Green fashion thus refers to environment-conscious brands that produce

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8 apparel items by using organic materials, recycled materials and with the minimum use of toxins and chemicals that may be potentially harmful for the environment (Maloney et al., 2014; Lea & Worsley, 2005). Green management practices have been recently experiencing proliferation (Sung & Lee, 2011; Maloney et al., 2014). Therefore, not only brands but also the consumers are being increasingly alerted by the environmental concerns within the fashion sector. Determining reasons behind this growth appears to be problematic as the factors contributing to this phenomenon seem to propel one another. Namely, an increase in availability of information about green products, an increase in the number of brands

initiating green strategies, and finally an increase in the amount of consumers trying to adopt green lifestyle can be pointed out (Maloney et al., 2014). Prior research suggests that the role of fashion is not limited to its functional or instrumental needs but it rather extends towards consumers' needs for belonging and expression of identity which in turn ease peers' validation and demonstration of social stand (Shaw, Hogg, Wilson, Shiu, & Hassan. 2006). It can be thus argued that consumers seek to demonstrate their identities, social groups and specific lifestyle through fashion. Moreover, consumers purchasing green products or showing interest in green brands believe they actively and positively contribute to the environment, that they can

support a brand which avoids harming the planet (Shaw et al., 2006; Dickinson & Carsky, 2005). Therefore it can be stated that these consumers' purchase decisions represent their personal values, beliefs and goals, linking them to the social branding strategy. More specifically, within the context of green fashion these opinions are being directly demonstrated to the external world simply through the means of clothing. Furthermore, previous research found a high correlation between consumer’s attitude and personal norms which can be thus related to relationship and social strategies (Thogersen & Olander, 2006).

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Brand attitude

Consumer attitude is one of the most frequently involved behavioural science concepts in advertising and the most important evaluation criteria (Franzen, 1999; Khandelwal, & Bajpai, 2011). Attitude is defined as a response to an object in a consistently favourable or unfavourable manner and a degree to which a person likes or dislikes that object (Ajzen & Fishbein 1980; Khandelwal, & Bajpai, 2011). The importance of consumer’s attitude is also related to its direct effect on purchase behaviour. The more the consumer expresses a positive brand attitude the more likely he evaluates a new product favourably (Joergens, 2006). The findings of prior research support the view that consumers tend to respond in a more favourable way to environmentally conscious advertisement than those without the green concerns (Mathur & Mathur, 2000; Phau & Ong, 2007). Ultimately, as a consequence of the instrumental attributes of fashion brands being argued to be less attractive to the consumers than the search for identity and the sense of belonging expressed through the brand use, the following hypothesis was formulated accordingly (Shaw, et al., 2006):

H1: In the fashion industry, the relationship green strategy and the social green strategy will have a stronger effect on brand attitude than the persuasion green branding strategy.

Brand credibility

The concept of brand credibility is defined as believability of the product information ingrained in a brand which depends on consumers' perceptions of whether the company has the ability and willingness to deliver promised values and services on a continuous basis (Erdem, Swait & Valenzuela, 2006). Credibility consists of two aspects, namely expertise and trustworthiness (Metzger & Flanagin, 2013). Whilst expertise indicates the extent to which a brand holds valid claims and is willing to deliver them, trustworthiness implies to consumer’s

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10 confidence that the brand is capable of delivering what is promised (Baek, Kim, &Yu, 2010; Ng, Butt, Khong, & Ong, 2014). In the light of green advertising, trustworthiness can be defined as a dependence on a brand or product based on the belief resulting from its

credibility and willingness about its environmental values and performance (Khandelwal & Bajpai, 2011). Trust was named to be the true differentiating feature for any company with increasing numbers of products and services which needs to focus on producing exact, unambiguous and truthful environmental claims in order to gain consumer’s trust

(Khandelwal & Bajpai, 2011). The literature suggests that higher perceived, or expected, quality associated with credible brands may increase consumer attitudes and evaluations of brands (Aaker, 1991). It can be then argued that consumers’ expectations about green brands are higher than about non-sustainable brands due to their promises to deliver environmentally conscious products. Interestingly, researchers observed that these high expectations about green products have been recently affected by the perception that these goods do not fulfil the environmental promises (Bigné-Alcañiz, Currás-Pérez & Sánchez-García, 2009). Researchers previously noted that consumers may not purchase green products because they perceive brands as unable to deliver the environmental claims (Phau & Ong, 2007; Ginsberg & Bloom, 2004). Moreover, nowadays, consumers express less trust towards green advertising as a result of various accusations of misleading environmental claims (Leonidou, Leonidou, Palihawadana, & Hultman, 2011 as cited in: Khandelwal & Bajpai, 2011). Consequently, practitioners need to acknowledge the impact of credibility on consumer’s brand evaluation. Marketers need to ensure that consumers perceive their brand as highly credible as it will play the dominant role in consumers’ behaviour by deactivating their doubts about brand’s green commitment and may ultimately moderate their purchase decisions. Furthermore, based on a signaling theory, brand credibility will also be an important factor in consumers’ evaluations and attitudes about the brand if the information the brand provides is perceived as uncertain

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11 by the consumer (Erdem &Swait, 2004). Following that rhetoric, the credibility of a brand increases consumers’ confidence in that brand’s product claims. Additionally, researchers established that perceived credibility of the brand influences consumer’s attitudes in a way that lower levels of credibility are linked with more negative attitudes towards the

advertisement and the advertised brand (Goldsmith, Lafferty, & Newell, 2000; Khandelwal, & Bajpai, 2011 ). Therefore, in the context of green advertising, consumers’ attitude towards the brand will be higher as they will be more likely to engage and adhere to environmental

product claim when the brand is perceived as highly credible.

H2: Brand attitude will be higher when the perceived credibility of the brand is high than when the perceived credibility of the brand is low.

In conjunction with the main purpose of fashion being associated with representation of people’s identity and their need for belonging, it can be stated that the consumers seek in fashion brands the fulfilment of these values (Shaw et al., 2006; Dickinson & Carsky, 2005). Consequently, that implies that the consumers have certain expectations towards fashion brands and they trust that a specific brand they use is able to meet these expectations. The concept of trustworthiness relates directly to the brand credibility in the eyes of a consumer (Baek, Kim, &Yu, 2010; Ng, Butt, Khong, & Ong, 2014). Furthermore, as stated previously, in the particular context of green brands, consumers’ trustworthiness is ingrained in

brands ability and willingness to act on their environmental claims (Khandelwal & Bajpai, 2011). Following that rhetoric, consumers will express more trust towards fashion brands they perceive as capable of fulfilling their needs to communicate their relationship with the brand, their identities and social values to others. Additionally, brands generating more trust and credibility from their consumers are also expected to acquire more positive brand attitudes (Aaker, 1991). Based on these observations, the last hypothesis of the study was developed:

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12 H3: In the fashion industry, the relationship green strategy and the social green

strategy will have a stronger effect on brand attitude than the persuasion green branding strategy but more when the perceived credibility of the brand is high than when the perceived credibility of the brand is low.

Figure 1. Conceptual Model.

Methods section

Research Design

The aim of the study was to investigate how relationship, social and persuasion green branding strategies affect brand attitude in the fashion industry. Additionally, a moderation effect of brand credibility was added to the model and further assessed. An experimental study was developed in order to test the hypotheses. The experimental design was a mixed between-within subjects design with one between-subjects (Branding strategy: social vs. persuasion vs. relationship strategies) and one within-subjects (Brand credibility) factors. Branding strategy (1 between-subjects experimental factor) X Brand Credibility (1 within-subjects experimental factor).

Branding strategies

Brand Credibility Social Persuasion Relationship

Brand with high credibility

Brand with low credibility

Figure 2. Experimental design. Branding strategies:

social, relationship, persuasion

Brand attitude

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13 This design allowed direct comparisons of different levels of brand credibility and the branding strategies without exposing the participants to an excessive number of

advertisements.

Sample

The eventual sample of 101 participants was found to answer the research question and test the hypotheses. Due to uncompleted experiment two participants were then excluded from further analyses. All subjects (N=99) were recruited online through the means of social net-working websites, such as Facebook, using a convenience sampling method. The participants’ age ranged from 18 to 51 (M=26.13 , SD=4.66) and 18.2% of them were male. The sample consisted mainly (94%) of highly educated individuals with 65.7% of them being currently Master students. The majority of participants (53.5%) were current university students. The most frequent nationality amongst the participants was Polish (29.2%), followed by Dutch (24.2%) and German (6.1%).

In order to assess whether the random assignment to different condition was successful in terms of demographics, square tests were performed. Based on the results of the chi-square tests, there were no significant differences between the three conditions with regards to the education level, (χ2= 9.91, N = 99, p = .48); nationality, (χ2= 52.12, N = 99, p= .69) nor current profession of the participants, (χ2= 99.68, N = 99, p= .29). Moreover, a one-way anal-ysis of variance revealed non-significant age differences between the groups F(2,96) = 2.01, p= .14. The randomization can be therefore judged as successful as the three groups did not differ significantly on any of the demographic measures assessed. Randomization to each of the conditions resulted in the following distribution: 35 respondents were assigned to relation-ship branding strategy manipulation followed by social branding strategy manipulation (n=32) and persuasive branding strategy (n=32).

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Stimulus Material

Branding strategy, a between-subjects experimental factor, was manipulated at three different levels: social strategy, persuasion strategy and relationship strategy. Subjects in each condition were exposed to one type of message, corresponding to one of the brand strategies. Beneficial to increasing the internal validity and to minimizing any confounding factors, the message content in the advertisements, each tailored to a distinctive green branding strategy, was identical per condition. Additionally, the advertisements differed across conditions only on that message and all the other aspects were kept equal. In order to choose the brands suitable for stimulus material representing high and low credibility, a pilot study was

conducted among 10 participants who were asked to rate six, globally known fashion brands. The brands the respondents rated were the following: American Apparel, Nike, H&M,

Topshop, TOMS and New Balance. In line with the credibility theory which states that previous exposure is necessary for people to perceive a brand as credible, the stimulus material was created using already existing and globally known brands (Erdem, & Swait, 1998). Based on the results of the pilot study the brand representing the lowest credibility was H&M and the brand with highest credibility was TOMS. Three different messages were created and then incorporated on an already existing print advertisement of the chosen

companies to test three different branding strategies (see Appendix C). As the social branding strategy links the brand with specific social groups and their goals and allows communicating something to others, it was thus operationalized using the following message: “Consciously fashionable, express your values through sustainable clothing”. In order to create an

advertisement enhancing the persuasion advantages of a brand, the following user testimonial was used for the persuasion strategy: “We recycle, do not waste, use organic materials, are ethical, are climate smart, are sustainably fashionable”. Ultimately, relationship strategy advertisement aimed to portray the brand as having a specific personality that matches the

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15 consumer’s attainment of personal goals by buying that brand. Therefore, the advertisement was operationalized by the use of the following statement: “Our clothes are like you: more fashionable, caring about other people and the planet”. Already existing advertisements were used to increase external validity of the experiment and keep the authenticity of the material at the highest level. The stimulus contained thus brand logo and the message was the only information added to the original advertisements.

Procedure

The experiment was created with the use of online survey software called “Qualtrics”. A link provided to the participants via e-mail and Facebook redirected them directly to the experiment. The respondents were first presented with an informed consent where their agreement was mandatory prior to proceed with the experiment (see Appendix B). They were invited to voluntarily participate in an online study into “various branding strategies and related behaviours”. The anonymity and confidentiality regarding the data collected were guaranteed. Additionally, only participants of 18 years old or above were eligible and thus taken into account. When accessing the online experiment, subjects were randomly assigned to one of the three following conditions, each corresponding to a different strategy: persuasive green branding strategy, social green branding strategy or relationship green branding

strategy. All the respondents (N=99) in each condition were thus exposed to one of the green branding strategies and two different brands, one highly credible (i.e. TOMS) and one with low credibility (i.e. H&M). The scales measuring the brand attitude followed up after each advertisement. Subsequently, brand credibility was measured asking the participants to rate seven statements. Further, the respondents were asked whether they are familiar with the brands present on the stimuli, followed by a question about an overall attitude towards green fashion. The manipulation check questions with regards to messages constructed to test

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16 different branding strategies were then presented which also marked the end of randomized part of the experiment. The remaining questions concerning demographic information were then asked (see Appendix A). Lastly, the manipulation check questions appeared at the end of the questionnaire with debrief note on the closing page thanking for the participation (see Appendixes D and E).

Measures

Brand Attitude

Brand attitude was measured using a scale created by Campbell (1995). The scale was composed of six 7-point Likert-type items which were as follows: bad vs. good, unpleasant vs. pleasant, unfavourable vs. favourable, negative vs. positive, dislike vs. like and poor quality vs. high quality. Firstly, the following items were reversly recoded as the questions were asked in the opposite direction than the others: like vs. dislike, pleasant vs. unpleasant and good quality vs. bad quality. Secondly, a principal component analysis (PCA) was

conducted separately for each condition to investigate whether these items measured the same latent concept of Brand attitude. PCA performed on the brand attitude towards H&M in the persuasion strategy condition showed that the six items form a single unidimensional scale as only one component has been extracted with an eigenvalue above 1 (EV= 5.81), which was also reflected in the clear inflexion point on the scree plot (see Figure 3). All the items correlated positively with the first component, they were therefore all included in the final analysis. Altogether, the six items explained 96.97% of variance in the original variables. Internal consistency of these items proved the scale to be reliable (α= .99). The brand attitude towards H&M measured in the social branding strategy and in the relationship branding strategy conditions constructed both reliable scales, respectively: α= .93 and α= .91. Internal consistency of items measuring brand attitude towards TOMS was further confirmed proving

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17 the scale to be highly reliable in persuasive branding strategy condition (α= .98), social

branding strategy condition (α= .91) and relationship branding strategy condition (α= .94). Based on PCA and reliability test results, total Brand attitude scale measuring attitude towards H&M for each condition was computed by averaging the scores on all the six items. Table 1 presents the univariate descriptive statistics for each condition distinctively (see Appendix F). All the scores were then summed across the conditions resulting in the scale assessing total Brand attitude towards H&M (M= 3.85, SD= 1.55) and the total Brand attitude towards TOMS (M= 5.26, SD= 1.34).

Brand familiarity

Brand familiarity was measured by asking the participants to indicate whether they are familiar or not with the presented brand (H&M/ TOMS). Brand familiarity was thus a di-chotomous variable presenting respondents with “Yes” or “No” options. Both brands, H&M and TOMS were assessed familiar by the majority of the respondents, respectively 99% and 61.6%.

Attitude towards green fashion

Overall attitude towards green fashion was assessed with the means of Campbell's scale (1995). The six 7-point Likert-type items were identical to the measurement of attitude towards the brand (bad vs. good, unpleasant vs. pleasant, unfavourable vs. favourable, nega-tive vs. posinega-tive, dislike vs. like and poor quality vs. high quality). Prior to further analyses three items (like vs. dislike, pleasant vs. unpleasant and good quality vs. bad quality) were reversly recoded in order for all the questions to be asked to be the same direction. A principal component analysis (PCA) was then performed using the overall attitude towards green fash-ion measurement in all the conditfash-ions. Each branding strategy conditfash-ion formed a single

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uni-18 dimensional scale by extracting one component with all the items correlating positively with the first component. The highest variance explained by all the six items was noted in the per-suasive strategy condition (85.74%) with the item dislike vs. like reported as having the strongest association with the component (factor loading is .96; see Table 2). Reliability of the scale was tested based on the internal consistency of all the items and resulted in the persua-sion strategy condition reporting the highest results (α= .96), followed by relationship strategy condition (α= .94) and social strategy condition (α= .94). A scale was further created by com-puting average scores on the six items (M= 5.7, SD= 1.27).

Brand credibility

Brand credibility was a within-subjects experimental factor operationalized with a use of a highly credible brand, TOMS and a brand with low credibility, H&M. Participants in each of the three conditions were exposed to both brands. Each respondent saw thus the same two brands.

The respondents were also required to answer whether the two brands used in the stimuli were perceived as intended by the manipulation with regards to brand credibility. As the concept of credibility is based on two aspects being expertise and trustworthiness, the expertise and trust model was used to assess brand credibility (Erdem & Swait, 2004). A scale created by Erdem and Swait (1998) was adapted for the purpose of the current study. The scale measuring expertise and trustworthiness composed in total of seven 7-point Likert-type items ranging from 1 being Strongly Disagree to 7 Strongly Agree. The items were as

following: “This brand has a name you can trust”; “This brand seems competent to me”; “This brand has the ability to deliver what it promises”; “This brand’s product claims are believable”; “This brand doesn’t pretend to be something it isn’t”; “This brand delivers what it promises”; “Over time, my experiences with this brand have led me to expect it to keep its

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19 promises, no more and no less”. A principal component analysis was performed to verify whether these items measure the concept of brand credibility. All the items were used in the following analyses as only one component was extracted with the eigenvalue above 1

(eigenvalue 6.03). The seven items explained the most variance in the original variables in the relationship strategy condition and the brand TOMS (91.63%), followed by 84.2% of variance explained in the persuasion strategy and H&M. Internal consistency of all the items across all the conditions for both brands proved the scales to be reliable (see Table 3). The scales were then computed by averaging the scores on the seven items for each condition and for each brand separately.

As intended by the study, H&M aimed at lower brand credibility than the stimuli including the brand TOMS, the brand with higher credibility. Therefore, in order to test whether the manipulation was successful and to ensure the internal validity of the study, three paired t-tests were conducted. On average, participants in the persuasion strategy condition perceived the brand H&M as less credible (M= 3.85, SD= 1.73) than the brand TOMS (M= 5.18, SD= 1.23). This difference, Mdifference=-1.32, 95% CI [-2.22, -0.42], was significant t(31)= -3.01, p= .005. People who were exposed to the social brand strategy stimuli also rated the H&M brand as less credible (M= 3.84, SD= 1.41) than TOMS (M= 5, SD= 1.01). The difference Mdifference= -1.12 and the results show that people regard H&M with less credibility than TOMS t(31)= -3.29, p= .003, 95% CI [-1.91, -0.44]. Additionally, people exposed to the relationship brand strategy confirmed the previous results by identifying H&M as a brand with lower credibility (M= 3.79, SD= 1.62) than TOMS (M= 5.07, SD= 1.43). That difference proved to be significant, Mdifference=-1.29, 95% CI [-2.11, -0.46], was significant t(34)= -3.15, p= .003.

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20

Manipulation checks

To assess whether the stimuli was perceived by the respondents as intended by the study, three questions, one per each branding strategy, were asked to participants

corresponding to the message content on the advertisements. Participants were asked to rate the following items on a scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree): To what extent have you perceived the following statement as liking the brand with goals of a specific social group and allowing to communicate something about yourself to others: “Consciously fashionable, express your values through sustainable clothing.”; To what extent have you perceived the following statement as communication practical information about the brand and enhancing the functional advantages of using this brand? “We recycle, do not waste, use organic materials, are ethical, are climate smart, are sustainably fashionable.”; To what extent have you perceived the following statement as showing the specific personality of the brand matching consumer’s personal goals? “Our clothes are like you: more fashionable, caring about people & the planet”. On average, the stimuli corresponding to the persuasion strategy was rated the highest amongst the three messages (M= 5.34, SD= 1.31), whereas the message tailored to the relationship strategy reported the lowest average scores (M= 4.89, SD= 1.47). On average, the message matching the social branding strategy scored in between (M= 5.27, SD= 1.26). It can be thus stated that the manipulation was successful for two of the three conditions, except for the relationship strategy condition where the average score is located between “Neither agree nor disagree” and “Somewhat agree”.

Results

This study proposed that in the fashion industry, the relationship green strategy and the social green strategy will have a stronger effect on brand attitude than the persuasion green branding strategy (H1). H2 stated that the brand attitude will be higher when the perceived

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21 credibility of the brand is high than when the perceived credibility of the brand is low.

Furthermore, final hypothesis (H3) assumed that in the fashion industry, the relationship green strategy and the social green strategy will have a stronger effect on brand attitude than the persuasion green branding strategy but more when the perceived credibility of the brand is high than when the perceived credibility of the brand is low. Prior to testing these hypotheses, a correlation test was run to assess whether the control variable, the overall attitude towards green fashion was related to the dependent variable, brand attitude.

Control Variables

In order to identify any extreme scores for the dependent and control variables the scatterplots were created. Based on the scatterplots representing the relationship between brand attitude towards H&M and the overall attitude towards green fashion (see Figure 4) and between brand attitude towards TOMS and the overall attitude towards green fashion (see Figure 5), three outliers were identified. These extreme scores were thus excluded from the further bivariate correlation analysis. The results showed that there is a significant,

moderately strong negative correlation between the overall attitude towards green fashion and the overall brand attitude towards H&M: the higher the attitude towards green fashion one has, the lower the attitude towards H&M, r = -.31, p = .002. Subsequently, there was a strong positive correlation between the overall attitude towards green fashion and the attitude towards the brand TOMS, r = .56, p < .001. Both scatterplots (see Figure 4 and Figure 5) summarize these results. As proved by the correlation analyses, the overall attitude towards green fashion was related to the dependent variables, it was thus controlled for in the final analyses.

Out of 35 participants in the persuasive strategy condition, 23 (65.7%) were familiar with the brand TOMS. That group showed higher brand familiarity than that of the 32

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22 participants in the social strategy condition, of whom 20 (62.5%) were familiar with the brand or the persuasive condition. Nonetheless, based on a chi-square, these differences were not significant (χ2= .65, N = 99, p= .72). Furthermore, the differences between the conditions with regards to familiarity about the brand H&M were also not significant (χ2= 2.12, N = 99, p= .35).

Hypotheses testing

One way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed to test whether in the fashion industry the relationship green strategy and the social green strategy have a stronger effect on brand attitude than the persuasion green branding strategy. Based on the Levene’s test, the assumption of the homogeneity of variance was met p= .552, it can be therefore assumed that the variances between the groups are not significant. The results showed that there was no significant effect of the type of the green branding strategy on the brand attitude (p= .774). It therefore means that there was no significant difference in the brand attitude scores between the branding strategy conditions. Based on the ANOVA results the first hypothesis of the study was not supported.

In order to test the second hypothesis of the study three paired t-tests were conducted separately for each condition. On average, respondents exposed to the persuasion branding strategy rated their attitude towards the less credible brand, H&M, lower (M= 4.1, SD= 1.86) than their attitude towards the brand TOMS (M= 5.36, SD= 1.56). This difference, Mdifference= -1.25, 95% CI [-2.19, -0.31], was significant t(31)= -2.71, p= .011. The brand with higher credibility, TOMS, also scored significantly higher on brand attitude in the social strategy condition (M= 5.31, SD= 1.16) than lower credibility brand H&M (M= 4.18, SD= 1.58), with the difference of -1.13, 95% CI [-1.88, -0.38], proved to be significant t(31)= -3.06, p= .005. Lastly, the relationship strategy condition yielded lower brand attitude scores for the brand

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23 with low credibility H&M (M= 4.1, SD= 1.5), than for the highly credible brand TOMS (M= 5.09, SD= 1.53). That difference (Mdifference= -0.99) was also significant and thus contributed to the previous results t(34)= -2.31, p= .027, 95% CI [-1.85, -0.12]. As a consequence, based on the results of the three paired t-tests, the hypothesis was confirmed.

A mixed design analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) with the type of strategy as between-subjects factor, brand credibility as a within-subjects factor and the overall attitude towards green fashion as covariate was conducted to assess their effect on brand attitude. The results revealed a significant main effect among the subjects of exposure to the credibility of the brand (low/H&M vs. high/TOMS) on the respondents’ brand attitudes, F(1, 95) = 19.13, p< .0005, ŋ2 = .168. Moreover, the overall attitude towards green fashion proved to

significantly predict the brand attitude F(1, 95) = 36.46, p< .0005, ŋ2 = .277. However, the results showed a non-significant main effect of the exposure to a different type of brand strategy on participants’ brand attitudes F(2, 95) = 2.32, p = .104, ŋ2 = .047. Furthermore, the interaction effect between the type of branding strategy and brand credibility was found to be not significant F(2, 95) = 2.36, p = .1, ŋ2 = .047.

Discussion and Conclusions

The aim of the research was to investigate the effect of three green branding strategies: social, persuasion and relationship on brand attitude when taking into account the level of credibility of the advertised brands. The findings partially supported the hypotheses of the study. Firstly, the results of this experimental study showed that people express higher brand attitude towards the highly credible brand as compared to the brand with low credibility. Thus, confirming the assumptions proposed by the second hypothesis, brand credibility can be stated as playing an important role in consumers’ evaluations of that brand. These results are therefore in line with the signaling theory the information provided by the brand needs to be

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24 perceived as certain and credible in order for the consumers to judge the brand positively (Erdem &Swait, 2004). Moreover, the results are also in conformity with previous studies that proved the lower levers of credibility being related to more negative attitudes towards the advertised brand (Goldsmith, et al., 2000; Khandelwal, & Bajpai, 2011 ). Consequently, the research confirms previously stated assumption that the advertisements and brands

characterised by higher credibility are more successful (Davari & Strutton, 2014).

Furthermore, the first hypothesis of the study was rejected which demonstrates that consumers’ brand attitude was not affected by the type of branding strategy chosen : social strategy, persuasion strategy or relationship strategy. The design of the study was based on the IFEC model used to test and predict the effectiveness of different branding strategies (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). Nonetheless, the findings showed no significant differences between the three strategies tested rendering the choice of the most effective strategy unachievable.

A potential explanation for these results can be thus found in the lack of the pretests of the effectiveness of the messages created. Namely these pretests include interviews of the target group aiming at determining the most salient beliefs of the tested behaviour, further interviews measuring the beliefs selected in the previous tests and then ultimately testing of the message developed before conducting the experiment (van den Putte & Dhondt, 2005). As reflected in the results of the manipulation check, the message tailored to the relationship strategy was not perceived by the participants as intended by the manipulation. These unsatisfactory results regarding the manipulation of the relationship strategy might have influenced the final findings of the study, mainly the non-significant effect of branding strategy type on brand attitude. Additionally, the brand strategy was designed as a between subjects factor which did not allow the participants to assess the differences between the messages corresponding to each strategy. The possible alternatives, improvements and recommendations for future research are discussed further on.

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25 Additionally, the moderating effect of the brand credibility was found to be

non-significant which indicates that the attitude towards brands presented in the three different branding strategies did not vary depending on people’s judgement of the brand credibility. This implies that the brand credibility is a dominating factor in people’s evaluations of environmental claims the fashion brands make. This observation shades some light on consumers’ priorities when judging the brand. Furthermore, it can be explained through reported by previous studies consumers’ overall mistrust towards green advertising resulting from many unfulfilled environmental claims (Leonidou, et al., 2011; Khandelwal & Bajpai, 2011; Phau & Ong, 2007; Ginsberg & Bloom, 2004). If the consumers perceive a brand as untrustworthy they are more likely refuse to treat their environmental claims as believable and they are thus less likely to be persuaded by a particular branding strategy. Brand credibility will play a more important role in that judgement.

Finally, the brand attitude was proved to have a relationship with the overall attitude towards green fashion. Interestingly, the relations between these concepts were different depending on the level of brand credibility. The results proved a moderate negative

relationship between the overall attitude towards green fashion and the attitude towards the low credibility brand. Additionally, the findings reported a strong positive relationship between the overall attitude towards green fashion and the attitude towards the high

credibility brand. On the one hand, this implies that the more positive attitude towards green fashion the consumers have, the more negative their attitude towards the low credibility brand. On the other hand, the consumers who have more positive attitudes towards green fashion will show even more positive attitudes towards highly credible brand, than those who express themselves less positively about green fashion. In the particular context of green fashion, this observation also adheres to the results of previous studies demonstrating that environmental concerns are perceived as more credible if claimed by completely sustainable

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26 and green brands, for instance TOMS, as compared to brands only offering some green or sustainable products, such as H&M (Ong & Phau 2007). However, in spite of controlling for attitudes towards green fashion, the brand attitude did not differ significantly depending on the branding strategy.

The aforementioned explanation accounting for the non-supported hypothesis about the effect of different branding strategies on consumers’ brand attitudes is one of the limitations of the study. A limited timeframe and resources did not allow the implementation of all the specific steps to test the message prior to creating the stimuli material for the experiment. Therefore, future research would benefit from replicating this study using a message that was created according to four-phase plan to develop an effective persuasive communication (van den Putte & Dhondt’s, 2005). As suggested by van den Putte and Dhondt (2005), in order to develop more effective and persuasive branding strategies the four-phase plan is advised to be followed with precision. As the credibility was found to be the defining factor of consumers’ brand attitudes, it would be insightful for future research to investigate the congruency of a fashion brand with the environmental claims. It will be of a great scientific and practical relevance to test whether any fashion brand can start implementing new green products with success. In conjunction with the results of the current study it could be then advisable for brand strategists to first measure the level of brand credibility as perceived by the consumers and only once a satisfying level is attained, introduce new green products. This strategy may reduce the risk of launching unsuccessful products.

Even though the experimental design was chosen purposely, it represents some weaknesses. The green branding strategy was treated as a between-subjects factor to avoid exposing the participants to advertisements in a repeated manner but its weakness is to control for individual differences that might be confounding factors. Moreover, the participants in that particular design could not judge the specific differences between the strategies as each

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27 condition was exposed to only one message. This characteristic might have influenced the results and can be the explanatory factor for the brand credibility playing the significant role in consumers’ evaluations of the brands. As the stimuli only differed on the brand credibility level, the participants might have focused mainly on that factor. This would imply that their primary attention was mainly driven by the difference in brands and the credibility levels and not the branding strategy. It may also be stated that in an experimental study the respondents expect a certain manipulation to occur and therefore their judgements may be dimmed in these artificial conditions and they might differ in real-life settings. Further research could then treat the branding strategy as a within-subjects factor for the comparison purposes.

In spite of the above mentioned limitations and the results being partially supported, the study represents a valuable contribution to the field of persuasive communication and more particularly green branding. Overall brand credibility proved to be the dominant factor in consumers’ brand evaluations in the context of green advertising in fashion. The study addressed the green fashion in order to bridge the research gap in that field and as it has recently become the second largest green market (Maloney, et al., 2014). Nonetheless, the results can be generalised to other brands as the importance of brand credibility can be applicable to broader contexts of persuasive communication. Therefore, this study represents valuable guidelines for practitioners aiming to implement new green products by suggesting that before creating believable environmental claims and before developing a green branding strategy it is worth examining the credibility of the brand itself.

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Appendix A Background questionnaire

1. What is your age?

____ years old.

2. What is your gender?

1. Male 2. Female

3. What is your highest completed education? If you are a student, please indicate the level

of education you are currently attending. 1. Primary school 2. Secondary school 3. College 4. University [Bachelor] 5. University [Master] 6. University [PhD or higher]

4. Please indicate your current profession

_______________________

5. What is your nationality?

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35

Appendix B Consent form

Dear participant,

Thank you for taking part in this study that is carried out under the responsibility of the ASCoR research institute, being part of the University of Amsterdam, conducted under the supervision of dr. Ester de Waal.

To complete my master's degree at the Graduate School of Communication, University of Amsterdam, I am conducting a research into various branding strategies and related behaviours.

You will be thus shown a couple of advertisements which will be then followed by several questions.

The survey will take about 10 minutes to complete. Please note that there are no wrong an-swers and your honest opinion is what I am looking for. All data collected in this study will be used for academic purposes only. Your anonymity will be thus secured and you can stop the survey at any time, without any consequences. If you have any additional questions please do not hesitate to contact me via the following e-mail: zuzannne@gmail.com. All contacts will be treated with strict confidentiality.

I hope you've been provided with the sufficient information about thus study.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank you in advance for your time and participation in this study and thus for your help with my Master’s thesis. I truly appreciate it.

Sincerely,

Zuzanna Skorupinska

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Appendix C. Stimuli

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37

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38

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39

Appendix D. Testing materials

Brand attitude

My overall impression with the brand H&M/TOMS is: Bad/ Good

Like/ Dislike

Pleasant/ Unpleasant Unfavourable/ Favourable Negative/ Positive

Good quality/ Bad quality

Brand credibility

Please read the statements below. These statements are related to H&M/TOMS as a brand in general. Please indicate to what extent you agree or disagree with the following:

This brand has a name you can trust This brand seems competent to me

This brand has the ability to deliver what it promises This brand’s product claims are believable

This brand doesn’t pretend to be something it isn’t This brand delivers what it promises

Over time, my experiences with this brand have led me to expect it to keep its promises

Brand Familiarity

Are you familiar with the brand H&M/TOMS: Yes/No

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40

Overall attitude towards green fashion

Please indicate your overall attitude towards green fashion: Bad/ Good

Like/ Dislike

Pleasant/ Unpleasant Unfavourable/ Favourable Negative/ Positive

Good quality/ Bad quality

Manipulation Checks

To what extent have you perceived the following statement as liking the brand with goals of a specific social group and allowing to communicate something about yourself to others: Consciously fashionable, express your values through sustainable clothing.

Strongly Disagree / Strongly Agree

To what extent have you perceived the following statement as communicating practical information about the brand and enhancing the functional advantages of using this brand? We recycle, do not waste, use organic materials, are ethical, are climate smart, are sustainably fashionable.

Strongly Disagree/ Strongly Agree

To what extent have you perceived the following statement as showing the specific personality of the brand matching consumer’s personal goals?

Our clothes are like you: more fashionable, caring about people & the planet. Strongly Disagree/ Strongly Agree

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