Wie reagieren Öko- und konventionelle Unternehmen der Lebensmittelbranche auf Kundenanfragen zu ihrem gesellschaftlich verantwortungsvollen Verhalten?

Summary

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is gaining in importance for food companies since CSR increases customer loyalty. So far, there are no studies on how companies
respond to customer requests addressing their CSR-activities and whether organic companies (OCs) respond differently compared to conventional companies (CCs). Therefore, 200 inquiries were sent to food companies (OCs and CCs) requesting for information on their specific CSR-activities. The company responses were analysed by evaluative qualitative content analysis.Overall 67% of the companies responded to the inquiries. The results indicate slight differences in the professionality and the indication of comprehensible information between OCs and CCs. One third of all companies communicated only a low implementation level of CSR or no activities at all. OCs communicated a higher implementation level for environmentally friendly
activities and their waste manage expectations and to legitimate the price premium for organic products, OCs have to implement and communicate more responsible activities in all CSR-dimensions (e.g. employee and procurement concerns) compared to CCs.