Brand Social Responsibility in the FMCG Sector

The influence of product-related vs. non-product-related BSR

activities on consumer’s purchase intentions

Master Thesis Exposé

Meike Brunz

Kirchweg 25

34121 Kassel

University of Kassel Faculty of Economics and Management

DMCC – Dialog Marketing Competence Center

Prof. Dr. Ralf Wagner

Kassel, 17.12.2017

II

Abstract

Title: Brand Social Responsibility in the FMCG Sector: The influence of product-related

vs. non-product-related Brand Social Responsibility activities on consumer’s purchase

intentions

Keywords: Brand Social Responsibility, Consumer Behaviour; Purchase Intention; Fast

Moving Consumer Goods

Background: Daily news about natural catastrophes and how harmful substances in

clothes or food can lead to diseases contributes to an increased awareness of people on

what they consume every day. They are becoming increasingly concerned about their

well-being and the continuous existence of planet earth. It is therefore important for

companies to adapt to these needs and to emphasise how their products contribute to a

better living. This so-called Brand Social Responsibility refers to activities that can be

either related to the product or independent from the product and consists of legal, ethical

or socially responsible behaviour of the brand.

Purpose: This study aims at filling a gap concerning Brand Social Responsibility and

consumer’s purchase intention. The purpose is to find out if and to what extent product-

related or non-product-related Brand Social Responsibility activities have a positive

influence on consumer’s purchase intention. This study focuses on three exemplary

products of the Fast Moving Consumer goods sector and moreover seeks to analyse

whether there are differences between these three products.

Method: The influence of product-related and non-product-related Brand Social

Responsibility activities on consumer’s purchase intention will be surveyed via an

empirical study. A first desk research on existing literature will help developing first

concepts and research hypotheses. Then, an online survey will be conducted and

displayed on consumers interested in sustainability and those who are not interested in

this topic. To gather a sufficient number of participants, the survey will be distributed in

online forums, on social media networks and in the personal environment of the author.

The collected data will be evaluated using structural equation modelling.

III

Table of contents Abstract ........................................................................................................................... II

Table of contents .......................................................................................................... III

List of Abbreviations .................................................................................................... IV

List of Tables .................................................................................................................. V

1. Introduction ................................................................................................................. 1

2. Theoretical Framework .............................................................................................. 2

2.1 Brand Management: An Overview ......................................................................... 2

2.2 Corporate Social Responsibility vs. Brand Social Responsibility .......................... 3

2.3 The Fast Moving Consumer Goods Market: An Overview .................................... 5

3. Literature Review ....................................................................................................... 7

4. Research Questions ................................................................................................... 10

5. Methodology .............................................................................................................. 11

5.1 Selection of brands ................................................................................................ 11

5.2 Operationalism ...................................................................................................... 13

5.3 Data Collection ..................................................................................................... 14

6. Work Plan .................................................................................................................. 16

7. Overview of the chapters .......................................................................................... 17

References ...................................................................................................................... VI

IV

List of Abbreviations

BSR Brand Social Responsibility

CSR Corporate Social Responsibility

FMCG Fast Moving Consumer Goods

CEO Chief Executive Officer

V

List of Tables

Table 1: Turnover fairtrade products in Europe in 2016 .................................................. 6

Table 2: Literature Review ............................................................................................... 7

Table 3: Overview of the brands: Examples of their BSR activities .............................. 12

Table 4: Planned work plan ............................................................................................ 16

1

1. Introduction In its 2017 Globale Lebensmittel- und Getränketrends 2018 report, the market research

agency Mintel found out that consumers are increasingly sceptical towards food and

beverages. This results in a growing interest in the trustworthiness and security of food

and beverages. Consumers require products to be organic, ethical and to not cause

environmental damage. More and more companies adapt to these new standards when

launching a product or adapt their existing products. These activities can be summarised

under the term Brand Social Responsibility (BSR). Brand Social Responsibility consists

of the two topics Branding and Corporate Social Responsibility. Whereas Corporate

Social Responsibility addresses socially responsible activities that concern the company

as a whole, Brand Social Responsibility focuses on creating a socially responsible brand

(Grohmann and Bodur, 2015).

Brand Social Responsibility has not always been of importance: In 1776, Adam Smith

said: “I have never known much good done by those who profess to trade for the public

good”. However, these views have changed. In 2016, Fortune 500 companies annually

spent over $15 billion on activities that are socially responsible and on corporate

philanthropy (Harvard Law School Forum, 2016). It is becoming increasingly important

for companies to engage in Corporate Social Responsibility in order to remain relevant

and to adapt to the zeitgeist. Among business leaders it is believed that CSR is not only

an add-on but an economic imperative in today’s world (Beh, 1994, Murray and Vogel,

1997).

In Europe, and especially in Germany, the society is increasingly sensitised for topics

such as fair working conditions, recycling and gender equality. People tend to search for

a better world with less stress, less fear, but better food and more mindfulness (Kirchof

& Nickel, 2014). Thus, CSR activities in companies are no longer seen as something that

is optional, but expected. Companies have no longer only have to consider the quality,

size or style of their product; now they also have to think about BSR aspects when

developing a brand (Werther and Chandler, 2005). This not only has positive effects for

the consumers but also for the company itself (Polonsky and Jevons, 2009). Being

socially responsible could, amongst others, help improve the company’s financial

performance (Johnson, 2003) and the connection with consumers (Porter and Kramer,

2

2002). Moreover, it contributes to the market value (Luo and Bhattacharya, 2006).

Especially in the food sector, more and more people tend to be increasingly willing to pay

more for products that are organic or produced in a fair way (Ernst & Young, 2007).

Although the topic of Corporate Social Responsibility in combination with branding has

already been widely discussed, there are no scientific findings whether it is better to

communicate product-related BSR activities or non-product-related BSR activities in

order to enhance the consumer’s purchase intention. This thesis will investigate this

problem on the basis of three products from the Fast Moving Consumer Goods sector.

2. Theoretical Framework

2.1 Brand Management: An Overview

The former CEO of Quaker Oats, John Stewart, once said, “If this business were split up,

I would give you the land and bricks and mortar, and I would keep the brands and

trademarks, and I would fare better than you”. This shows how powerful brands can be

and, thus, they have to be managed carefully (Kotler & Armstrong, 2012).

The American Marketion Association (2017) defines a brand as a “name, term, design,

symbol, or any other feature that identifies one seller’s good or service as distinct from

those of other sellers”.

Brands can have several meanings which can be divided into six categories according to

Kotler and Armstrong (2012):

Attributes Brands are connected via attributes, through which the brand

defines its position, e.g., Chanel = expensive.

Benefits Benefits are the consumers’ reason to buy. This means that the

consumers transform the attributes into benefits, e.g., expensive =

good.

Values Consumers buy brands that represent their own values. Thus, they

are looking for brands whose values are conform to their own ones,

e.g., Apple, Armed Angels.

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Cultures Brands can represent the characteristics or values of a certain

country, e.g., Harley Davidson = American freedom.

Personality Brands might stand for a certain type of person or can be strongly

linked to a celebrity or spokesperson, e.g., George Clooney for

Nespresso.

User Brands can target certain groups of consumers whose beliefs

correspond with the values or the personality that the brand

represents, e.g., organic food brands such as Whole Foods.

Marketers have to align all these categories in order to provide meaning for the brand and

to protect it (Meister, 2012). This means that a brand should create a picture in the

consumer’s head. This is the so-called brand equity. A brand has positive brand equity

when consumers prefer it rather than other unbranded versions of the same product. The

brand equity is negative when consumers prefer the unbranded version rather than the

branded one. Most important for high brand equity is that the brand has to be relevant for

the consumer. This means that the brand has to distinguish itself from other brands, and

it has to meet the consumer’s needs. The brand has to stand for a certain promise to deliver

specific benefits, services, and experiences to its buyers (Kotler & Armstrong, 2012). For

example, Moët stands for luxurious and exclusive champagne whereas Jive promises low

prices. Thus, people who buy Moët feel better, richer and more beautiful than buyer of

Jive. Part of the promise could be that the brand represents specific values like

sustainability. This Brand Social Responsibility is often a mixture of marketing and

Corporate Social Responsibility and will be explained in the following chapter.

2.2 Corporate Social Responsibility vs. Brand Social Responsibility

There are several definitions of Corporate Social Responsibility. The European

Commission defines it as “the responsibility of enterprises for their impact on society”.

It is of the opinion that CSR should mainly be promoted by the company. Public

authorities should only play a supporting and tangential role (European Commission

2017). There are three areas of Corporate Social Responsibility: Legal Behaviour, Ethical

Behaviour and Social Responsibility Behaviour.

Legal Companies have to make sure that their employees know

and observe the relevant laws (Sullivan, 2009).

4

Ethical Companies should implement a written code of ethics and

build a company tradition of ethical behaviour in order to

avoid unethical or illegal behaviour like bribery, deceptive

advertising or inaccurate labelling. Moreover, they must

make sure that their employees comply with these

guidelines (Kotler & Keller, 2012).

Social Responsibility Consumers are more and more interested in

companies’ activities on social and environmental

activities. Deciding from which company to buy, invest in,

or work for is becoming a crucial factor (Hatch & Schultz,

2008).

How difficult it is to build a linear CSR image can be seen on the example of Unilever.

Even though the company engages in a lot of social and environmental activities and has

implemented an Unilever Sustainable Living Plan (Unilever, 2017), it is facing serious

cracks in its CSR façade. The company was accused of exposing its workers to mercury

in India in 2016. Moreover, in 2011, Unilever supervisors in Kenya were indicted of

harassing their workers sexually. Therefore, Unilever’s attempts to become a sustainable

company do not appear to credible anymore to NGO’s (Borelli, 2017). As a result, Brand

Social Responsibility is becoming increasingly important. In contrast to Corporate Social

Responsibility, it does not concentrate on the company level but develops a socially

responsible strategy for the brand. Grohmann and Bodur (2015) state that it differs from

CSR in three ways: “(1) consumers are the primary stakeholders, (2) there is a limited

transfer of CSR perceptions to the product brand level, and (3) it is based on holistic

perceptions rather than dimension-focused evaluations of social responsibility activities.”

Moreover, their study implicates that BSR activities have a positive influence on

consumers’ brand attitude and purchase intention whereas CSR activities only influence

corporate factors (e.g. investment intent or employment intent).

A Best Practice example for Brand Social Responsibility could be the shoe brand Toms.

The founder of the brand wanted to help children who suffered because they did not own

shoes. Thus, he founded Toms and the One for One-strategy. For every pair of Toms

shoes bought, another pair of shoes would be donated to poor children. Nowadays, the

company also helps people to get eye surgery, to gain access to water and to give birth

5

safely (Toms, 2017). The consumer gets the feeling that he is doing something good when

purchasing a pair of shoes. This example shows that companies can use BSR activities as

part of their marketing strategy. However, it has to be mentioned that Toms was founded

on basis of the BSR strategy.

In this thesis, product-related BSR activities include all aspects that are directly linked to

the product. This means that these are activities including the manufacturing process,

ingredients and the product’s packaging.

Non-product-related BSR activities cannot be directly linked to the product. There are

many possibilities to engage in a BSR activity that is not directly associated with the

product. This could be, e.g., paying fair wages to the workers, supporting a social or

environmental cause, and many more.

2.3 The Fast Moving Consumer Goods Market: An Overview

Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) are products that rotate very fast on the store

shelves. Therefore, the rotation stands for the speed of sale of a product (WuV, 2017).

Typical fast-selling products are consumer goods such as food, body care products or

cleaning products which are bought weekly, spontaneously and without long reflection.

The products are characterised by relatively low prices and a simple substitution with

qualitatively equal products. This distinguishes FMCG products from luxury goods

(AGOF, 2009). The products are distributed via classic retailers and drugstores (Statista,

2017). The FMCG market can be subdivided into the following categories (AGOF, 2009):

Source: Own representation based on AGOF, 2009.

Table 1: FMCG categories

Beverages

• Non-alcoholic beverages

• Beer

• Other alcoholic beverages and

spirits

Food

• Sweets and salty snacks

Baby Needs

Pet Needs

Detergents and Cleaners

Decorative Cosmetics and Skin Care

• Women’s cosmetics

6

• Frozen products and ready meals

Dairy Products

• Men’s cosmetics

• Hair-care products

• Personal-care products

• Dental-care products

The biggest consumer goods manufacturers worldwide are Nestlé (turnover: US-$90,8

bn), Procter & Gamble (turnover: US-$64,9 bn) and Pepsico (turnover: US-$62,8 bn). In

Germany, the biggest manufacturers are Henkel (turnover: 18,7 bn €) and Beiersdorf

(turnover: 6,7 bn €). It is typical of these companies that they often hide behind their

brands. Even though Beiersdorf itself is quite unknown, everybody knows its products

like Nivea or Labello (Statista, 2017).

Current challenges of the FMCG market are the increasing importance of the retail

brands, as well as the saturation of the consumer goods markets in Europe, USA and

Japan which leads to shorter product life cycles (Statista, 2017). Concerning

sustainability, Germany is the leading country in Europe with a turnover of 1,15 mio. €

on fair trade products in 2016. Especially regarding bananas, coffee, sugar and cocoa,

consumers are increasingly interested in organic products (Fairtrade International 2016).

Source: Own representation based on Fairtrade International, 2016.

Table 1: Turnover fairtrade products in Europe in 2016

1.155,12

534,96

272,51 270 266,87134 110,2 31,51 15,04

0,00200,00400,00600,00800,00

1.000,001.200,001.400,00

Turnover fairtrade products in Europe in 2016

Turnover

7

3. Literature Review Table 2: Literature Review

Authors, Year Publication Title Main Findings

Farooq, O.,

Aguenaou, S.

& Amor, M.A.

(2015)

Journal of

Applied

Business

Research

Corporate Social

Responsibility Policy

and Brand Value

In companies with high

investor interests, CSR

has a negative effect on

brand value

Graeff, T.R.

(1997)

Psychology &

Marketing

Consumption

Situations and the

Effects of Brand Image

on Consumers’ Brand

Evaluations

Marketers can manage

the congruence

between brand image

and self-image by

promoting various

consumption situations

Grohmann, B.

& Bodur, H.O.

(2015)

Journal of

Business Ethics

Brand Social

Responsibility:

Conceptualization,

Measurement, and

Outcomes

Shows the difference

between Corporate

Social Responsibility

and Brand Social

Responsibility

He, H., Zhu,

W., Gouran, D.

& Kolo, O.

(2016)

European

Journal of

Marketing

Moral identity

centrality and cause-

related marketing: The

moderating effects of

brand social

responsibility image

and emotional brand

attachment

BSR and emotional

brand attachment

positively moderate the

relationship between

consumer MI centrality

and the intention to

purchase the brand

Jin, Y.-J., Park,

S.-C. & Yoo,

J.-W. (2017)

Social Behavior

and Personality

Effects of Corporate

Social Responsibility

on Consumer

Credibility Perception

and Attitude Toward

Luxury Brands

Engaging in CSR does

not always lead to a

more positive

reputation. However,

no CSR activities lead

to a more negative

perception

8

Luo, X. &

Bhattacharya,

C.B. (2006)

Journal of

Marketing

Corporate Social

Responsibility,

Customer Satisfaction,

and Market Value

Corporate Social

Responsibility can

reduce customer

satisfaction and thus,

the market value

Nan, X. &

Heo, K. (2007)

Journal of

Advertising

Consumer Responses

to Corporate Social

Responsibility (CSR)

Initiatives: Examining

the Role of Brand-

Cause Fit in Cause-

Related Marketing

Regardless of the

brand-cause fit, an

advertisement with a

CRM message elicits

more favourable

consumer attitude

towards the company

Polonsky, M.

& Jevons, C.

(2019)

International

Marketing

Review

Global branding and

strategic CSR: an

overview of three types

of complexity

Social issue,

organizational and

communication

complexity must be

considered when

developing a CSR

strategy for a brand

Sen, S. &

Bhattacharya,

C.B. (2001)

Journal of

Marketing

Research

Does Doing Good

Always Lead to Doing

Better? Consumer

Reactions to Corporate

Social Responsibility

Companies’ CSR

initiatives have to be in

line with consumers’

beliefs on this topic in

order to be successful

Singh, J.,

Sanchez, M. &

del Bosque,

I.R. (2008)

Journal of

Business Ethics

Understanding

Corporate Social

Responsibility and

Product Perceptions in

Consumer Markets: A

Cross-cultural

Evaluation

Companies’ Corporate

Social Responsibility

activities are often not

perceived by the

consumer

Teusner, S.

(2010)

Gabler

Research

Kunden-Hersteller-

Beziehungen unter

Berücksichtigung des

This study explains

how the market

atmosphere influences

9

Marktklimas – Eine

empirische Studie im

Bereich Fast Moving

Consumer Goods

the brand loyalty on the

FMCG sector

van Rekom, J.,

Go, M.F. &

Calter, D.M.

(2014)

Journal of

Business

Research

Communicating a

company’s positive

impact on society –

Can plausible

explanations secure

authenticity?

Perceived authenticity

and fit enhance

consumers’ loyalty and

stakeholders’ attitudes

towards the company

Wong, J.Y. &

Dhanesh, G.S.

(2016)

Management

Communication

Quarterly

Communicating

Corporate Social

Responsibility (CSR)

in the Luxury Industry

The paradox between

luxury and CSR can be

overcome by either a

harmonious

coexistence of these

opposites or a slow

convergence

10

4. Research Questions This section illustrates initial drafts for possible research questions. These questions

should not be seen as finalised. It might be possible that other research questions come

up during further investigation of the theoretical literature that might be more interesting.

The hypotheses that are marked in bold are the ones that will be tested.

As He et al. (2016) pointed out, especially emotional moderators influence consumers’

perception on CSR activities. The influence was even higher when the emotional brand

attachment was high. As especially non-product related BSR activities aim at the

consumers’ emotions, it is assumed that they correlate significantly in a more positive

way with consumers’ purchase intentions than product-related BSR activities.

Ho.1: Non-product-related Brand Social Responsibility activities correlate

significantly more positive with consumers’ purchase intentions than

product-related Brand Social Responsibility activities.

HA.1: Non-product related Brand Social Responsibility activities do not correlate

significantly more positive with consumers’ purchase intentions than

product-related Brand Social Responsibility activities.

It is often believed that the concept of luxury on the one hand and acting in a socially and

environmentally responsible way do not fit together (Torelli, Monga & Kaikati, 2012;

Wong & Dhanesh, 2016). As not only companies but also consumers might believe this,

it is assumed that Brand Social Responsibility is generally regarded as less important for

luxury goods than it is for the other two product categories.

H0.2: BSR is significantly more important for sustainable brands or love brands

than it is for luxury goods.

HA.2: BSR is not significantly more important for sustainable brands or love

brands than it is for luxury goods.

From the paper of kfw Research (2012) on income distribution and education, it can be

seen that people with a higher education often also have a higher income and are less

likely to be unemployed in Germany. Moreover, they are more interested in a healthy

11

way of life and therefore decide more often to buy healthy food than people with a lower

education (Ohr, 1999). As a result, another hypothesis is that people with a higher income

are more interested in Brand Social Responsibility as a high income implies a higher

education.

H0.3: BSR is significantly more important for people with higher income as

higher income generally implies a higher education.

HA.3: BSR is not significantly more important for people with higher income

even though higher income generally implies higher education.

What products people buy depends on the situation and the occasion for which they buy

them. It is assumed that they choose different products when inviting colleagues than

when inviting their friends (Graeff, 1997). Therefore, the hypothesis is proposed that

people act differently when they buy the product for someone else. It is assumed that

consumers use sustainable products to show that they care about healthy lifestyle and

well-being (Kirchof & Nickel 2017).

H0.4: Participants that buy the product for someone else are significantly more

interested in the BSR of these products than participants who buy products

for themselves.

HA.4: Participants that buy the product for someone else are not significantly

more interested in the BSR of these products than participants who buy

products for themselves.

5. Methodology

5.1 Selection of brands

In order to examine the influence of product-related BSR activities and non-product-

related BSR activities on consumers’ purchase intentions, three products will be

presented. As already mentioned above, all three products are supposed to be from the

FMCG sector. However, to examine differences, every product should serve a different

purpose. Therefore, one product should be an luxury product. Here, Nespresso Intenso

was chosen. Nespresso is a coffee brand belonging to the Swiss food corporation Nestlé

S.A. which is the leading coffee production company worldwide (VuMA, 2017). The

coffee is sold in single-use aluminium capsules, so-called pods. The brand belongs to the

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premium price segment and is sold globally. The brand fits to the topic, as it promotes

the recyclability of its pods and its sustainably cultivated coffee. However, it has often

been criticised for the fact that the production of the aluminium is extremely energy-

consuming and thus not sustainable. In terms of non-product-related BSR, the brand

promotes its collaboration with Rainforest Alliance and the support of their coffee farmers

(Nespresso, 2017).

Next, Innocent Smoothies was chosen as a brand that advertises its sustainability strategy

a lot. The smoothies are promoted as being full of natural ingredients that help living a

healthier life and do not harm the environment. Its farmers have to meet certain

sustainable standards and it tries to minimise its carbon footprint during the whole

production process. That is why it tries to use as much recyclable packaging as possible.

Moreover, it founded a foundation to help the world’s hungry (Innocent Drinks, 2017).

Lastly, Ritter Sport was chosen to represent a brand people love. The brand is the second

favourite chocolate brand in Germany (VuMA 2016). It has the goal to only use

sustainable chocolate until 2020. To reach this goal, it has bought 2.500 hectare of land

in Nicaragua to cultivate its own sustainable chocolate. Moreover, it wants to reduce its

carbon footprint and use recyclable packaging (Ritter Sport, 2017).

Table 3: Overview of the brands: Examples of their BSR activities

Brand Product-Related BSR Non-product-related BSR

Nespresso

- Recyclable packaging

- Sustainable coffee

- Reduce carbon foodprint

-Collaboration with Rainforest

Alliance

- Supporting the coffee farmers

- Economic revival of South Sudan

as a coffee region

Innocent

- Recyclable packaging

- Sustainable ingredients

- Reduce carbon footprint

- Collaboration with WWF

- Help the world’s hungry

- Treating children suffering from

malnutrition

Ritter Sport - Recyclable packaging

- Sustainable chocolate

- Collaboration with Plant-for-the-

Planet

13

- Reduce carbon footprint - Support volunteer work of their

employees

- Support the hometown of Ritter

Sport

5.2 Operationalism Brand Awareness

Brand awareness is the first step to create a picture in the mind of the consumer and, as a

next step, to create brand equity (Ebel & Hofer, 2014). Therefore, participants will be

asked about their brand awareness of every brand. A 5-point Likert-scale could be used

in order to ask the participants how well they know the brand (1=“Not at all” … 5=“Very

well”). There are no data on brand awareness of Innocent Smoothies. However, as it is a

relatively young brand it is assumed that the brand awareness is high in terms of younger

people up to 30 years. There is no accessible information on the brand awareness of

Nespresso in Germany. However, as Nespresso ranks as the most popular brand for coffee

capsules (Statista 2017), it can be assumed that the brand awareness is quite high.

According to a market research of WuV (2011), Ritter Sport is the chocolate brand with

the highest brand awareness in Germany.

Interest in Brand Social Responsibility Issues

As Brand Social Responsibility is a rather specific and broad term, it will be subdivided

into three areas: Legal Behaviour, Ethical Behaviour and Social Responsibility Behaviour

in this thesis. Therefore, participants can rate their interest in each of these categories on

a 5-point Likert-scale from 1=”Not interested at all” to 5=”Very interested”. A few

examples for each category are given, as the umbrella term could be rather abstract.

Brand Purchase Intention

Furthermore, a 5-point Likert-scale will be used to query the brand purchase intention of

the participants (1=”I would not buy this brand at all.” to 5=”I am very interested in

buying this brand.”). Moreover, another question will be used to ask the participants

whether they would buy the brand for themselves or for someone else.

14

Product-related vs. Non-product-related BSR Activities

To assess if and to what extent product-related or non-product-related Brand Social

Responsibility activities have a positive influence on consumer’s purchase intentions, the

criteria will be presented on a 5-point Likert scale. Thus, participants can choose how

important each criterion is for them for each brand ranging from 1=”Not important at all”

to 5=”Very important”. In addition to the BSR activities, in which the three brands engage

in, purchase criteria like “Price”, “Brand” and “Taste” will be added to measure whether

the BSR activities rank higher or lower.

Willingness to Pay

Lastly, it will be tested whether participants are willing to pay more for socially

responsible products. A Nielsen survey from 2014 states that over 50% of global online

consumers are willing to pay more for products that are provided by companies that act

in an ethical way. Therefore, it will be examined in general whether participants are

willing to pay more and specifically how much more in percentages. For this, they have

the possibility to give a free answer, lest they will be influenced by different options.

5.3 Data Collection In order to answer the research questions, an Internet-based quantitative survey will be

designed. The survey could be uploaded on SoSci Survey, a free service for academic and

non-commercial purposes without functionality restrictions. Another advantage of this

service is the possibility to implement filter questions and to export the data in SPSS

readable files.

To examine the comprehensibility of the survey a pre-test will be conducted. The pre-test

should also examine the suitability of the three brands in relation to Brand Social

Responsibility.

The obligatory question for sustainability affinity is asked at the beginning of the survey.

Moreover, the general brand affinity of the participants is queried. Questions for gender,

age and income will be included to get an impression of the sample and to investigate

possible gender or income effects and age tendencies. As people often do not like to reveal

their monthly income, this question will be asked at the end of the survey and by means

of income groups (e.g. 0-500€, 500-1.500€…). It is aspired to reach a total amount of at

15

least 200 participants. To reach this number, three weeks are calculated for the data

acquisition. An additional week is included in the Work Plan in case the number of

participants is insufficient. To acquire the necessary number of participants, social media

platforms, mailing lists, as well as personal contacts could be used. An English version

of the survey is not planned up to now, as different brand awareness and cultural

backgrounds in different countries might bias the results. It is planned to include a raffle

of different REWE vouchers to encourage the participation. It should take around ten

minutes to answer the questionnaire. This time should be sufficient, as lengthy surveys

are regarded as being demotivating and lead to an increased breakup rate.

Lastly, a statistical structural equation model programme like SPSS or R will be used to

analyse the collected data. Initially, participants that have not answered seriously, (which

can be worked out by unusual answer patterns) will be eliminated from the data pool.

Afterwards, statistical tests can be conducted in order to answer the research questions.

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6. Work Plan Table 4: Planned work plan

Period Activity Description

01.11.17 – 31.12.17 Exposé

Definition of the topic, literature

review and theoretical

framework

01.01.18 – 14.02.18 Research Design

Designing the survey and

implementing it in a suitable

software

15.02.18 – 14.03.18 Field Research Running the survey

15.03.18 – 30.04.18 Analysis of the results Analysing the data collected

from the survey

01.05.18 – 31.05.18 Conclusions and final

revision

Drawing conclusions and

revising the entire work

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7. Overview of the chapters

1. Introduction……………………………………………………………………………..

2. Theoretical Background………………………………………………………………...

2.1 Brand Management ……………………………………………………...…....

2.2 Corporate vs. Brand Social Responsibility……………………………………

2.3 The Fast Moving Consumer Goods Market……………………………………

3. Hypotheses……………………………………………………………………………...

4. Methodology……………………………………………………………………………

4.1 Experimental Framework……………………………………………………...

4.1.1 Constructs and Operationalism………………………………………

4.1.2 Pre-Test……………………………………………………...............

4.1.3 Survey…………………………………………………….................

4.2 Analysis………………………………………………………………………..

4.2.1 Pre-Test Sample Audit………………………………………………

4.2.2 Sample Audit………………………………………………………...

4.2.3 Construct Verification………………………………………………

5. Results…………………………………………………………………………………..

6. Discussion………………………………………………………………………………

6.1 Summary and Interpretation…………………………………………………..

6.2 Limitations…………………………………………………………………….

6.3 Outlook………………………………………………………………………..

VI

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