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Informing logistics social responsibility from a consumer-choice-centered perspective

Tim Gruchmann (Faculty of Management, Westcoast University of Applied Sciences, Heide, Germany)
Imke Schmidt (Collaborating Centre on Sustainable Consumption and Production, Wuppertal, Germany)
Sarah Lubjuhn (Center for Media and Health, Gouda, The Netherlands)
Stefan Seuring (Department of Supply Chain Management, University of Kassel, Kassel, Germany)
Martine Bouman (Center for Media and Health, Gouda, The Netherlands)

The International Journal of Logistics Management

ISSN: 0957-4093

Article publication date: 18 December 2018

Issue publication date: 12 February 2019

1467

Abstract

Purpose

Although research has been conducted on logistics social responsibility (LSR) on the one hand, and sustainable consumption on the other hand, the interlinkages between LSR and sustainable consumption still lack conceptualization and empirical evidence. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to study empirically the interplay between logistics services and sustainable consumer choices. Such an analysis allows an investigation of consumer-choice-centered sustainable logistics practices to promote LSR in supply chains (SCs).

Design/methodology/approach

Based on expert interviews and in-depth consumer interviews, the authors conducted a three-stage qualitative, exploratory study with regard to sustainable logistics practices explicitly taking a consumer-choice-centered perspective into account.

Findings

As a result, consumer-choice-centered LSR categories were identified and discussed against the consumer social responsibility (ConSR) and other disciplines’ literature. In particular, consumer communication is necessary to enhance consumers’ awareness of sustainable logistics as current consumption behavior still hardly considers logistics services. Also, context- and situation-dependent SC configurations as well as financial incentives for sustainable consumption patterns promote more sustainable logistics services choices by end consumers.

Practical implications

Resolving certain frictions and rewarding positive behavior eases consumer’s decision making. By doing so, retailers need to support logistics service providers by stressing the benefits of more sustainable products and services as well as implementing more sustainable pricing schemes. Due to the consumer preferences, it is also important to achieve a context and situation dependent configurations to provide opportunities for more sustainable trade-offs.

Originality/value

The people dimension in SC management is seen as a promising field as the behavioral dynamics of consumers is rarely investigated in SC research. In this line, the study attempts to advance the theoretical underpinnings of corporate social responsibility in sustainable SCs. Therefore, this study contributes to theory by enriching the concept of LSR to include a consumer-choice-centered perspective and gives managerial as well as ethical implications on ConSR accordingly.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (FKZ 01UT1406B) for this study’s underlying research project “ILoNa.” Moreover, the authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for providing valuable comments on the manuscript which strongly helped to develop this study. Moreover, the authors would like to express sincere gratitude to Rosa Strube and Thomas Wagner from the Collaborating Centre on Sustainable Consumption and Production (CSCP) in Wuppertal for conducting and analyzing the expert interviews S7–S12 as well as the Center for Media & Health (CMH) in Gouda for conducting and analyzing the consumer interviews C1–C10.

Citation

Gruchmann, T., Schmidt, I., Lubjuhn, S., Seuring, S. and Bouman, M. (2019), "Informing logistics social responsibility from a consumer-choice-centered perspective", The International Journal of Logistics Management, Vol. 30 No. 1, pp. 96-116. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJLM-07-2018-0169

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited

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