Consumer Knowledge and Preferences for Organic and Sustainably Certified Wines: Lessons from the DACH Region—Germany, Austria, and Switzerland

Albert Franz Stockl, Daniel Moscovici (), Stephanie Tischler, Markus Walter Eitle and Claudia Dolezal
Additional contact information
Albert Franz Stockl: Institute Tourism, Wine Business and Marketing, IMC Krems University of Applied Sciences, 3500 Krems, Austria
Daniel Moscovici: Environmental Studies & Sustainability, Stockton University, Atlantic City, NJ 08205, USA
Stephanie Tischler: Institute Tourism, Wine Business and Marketing, IMC Krems University of Applied Sciences, 3500 Krems, Austria
Markus Walter Eitle: Institute Tourism, Wine Business and Marketing, IMC Krems University of Applied Sciences, 3500 Krems, Austria
Claudia Dolezal: Institute Tourism, Wine Business and Marketing, IMC Krems University of Applied Sciences, 3500 Krems, Austria

Sustainability, 2024, vol. 16, issue 11, 1-14

Abstract: The DACH geographic region comprises three countries in central Europe: Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. This study seeks to both understand the motivations for purchasing organic and sustainably certified wines in this region and identifies which type of consumer should be targeted for the continued growth of this wine sector. Our methodology includes an online questionnaire resulting in a sample size of 4553 respondents, evenly broken down by country. Our analysis includes simple statistics and more advanced statistical analysis of the dataset. Our results indicate that there is a correlation between wine knowledge, environmental awareness, and the likelihood of buying eco-certified wines. We find that those who are self-proclaimed wine experts have a higher willingness to pay for organic or sustainable certified wines. These customers are generally middle aged, most often male, live in multi-person households, have pursued some level of higher education, and many are self-employed. We believe this study captures the growing trend of organic and sustainable wine certifications. It also identifies who is already convinced and who will need more marketing/education before they are ready to buy organic or sustainable wine.

Keywords: wine; organic; sustainable; consumer behavior; central Europe; willingness to pay (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/11/4464/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/11/4464/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:11:p:4464-:d:1401244

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().