Green Brand of Companies and Greenwashing under Sustainable Development Goals

Tetyana Pimonenko, Yuriy Bilan, Jakub Horák, Liudmyla Starchenko and Waldemar Gajda
Additional contact information
Tetyana Pimonenko: Department of Marketing, Sumy State University, 40007 Sumy, Ukraine
Jakub Horák: School of Expertness and Valuation, The Institute of Technology and Business in České Budějovice, Okružní 517/10, 37001 České Budějovice, Czech Republic
Liudmyla Starchenko: Department of Economics, Entrepreneurship and Business Administration, Sumy State University, 40007 Sumy, Ukraine
Waldemar Gajda: Warsaw Management School-Graduate and Postgraduate School, Siedmiogrodzka 3A, 01204 Warszawa, Poland

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 4, 1-15

Abstract: Implementing Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and increasing environmental issues provokes changes in consumers’ and stakeholders’ behavior. Thus, stakeholders try to invest in green companies and projects; consumers prefer to buy eco-friendly products instead of traditional ones; and consumers and investors refuse to deal with unfair green companies. In this case, the companies should quickly adapt their strategy corresponding to the new trend of transformation from overconsumption to green consumption. This process leads to increasing the frequency of using greenwashing as an unfair marketing instrument to promote the company’s green achievements. Such companies’ behavior leads to a decrease in trust in the company’s green brand from the green investors. Thus, the aim of the study is to check the impact of greenwashing on companies’ green brand. For that purpose, the partial least-squares structural equation modeling (PLS-PM), content analysis and Fishbourne methods were used. The dataset for analysis was obtained from the companies’ websites and financial and non-financial reports. The objects of analysis were Ukrainian large industrial companies, which work not only in the local market but also in the international one. The findings proved that a one point increase in greenwashing leads to a 0.56 point decline in the company’s green brand with a load factor of 0.78. The most significant variable (loading factor 0.34) influencing greenwashing was the information at official websites masking the company’s real economic goals. Thus, a recommendation for companies is to eliminate greenwashing through the publishing of detailed official reports of the companies’ green policy and achievements.

Keywords: sustainable development; brand; content analysis; renewable energy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (28)

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