Sustainable Luxury , 1st ed. 2022 An International Perspective Palgrave Advances in Luxury Series

?This book addresses the issue of sustainability in the luxury industry, which has become a major topic of concern for brand managers, scholars, policy-makers, the media, and academia. Spanning 13 chapters, the authors provide insights from developed and developing countries, whilst at the same time exploring a variety of issues within sustainable luxury, the hidden value of secondhand, eco-luxury, circular economy principles and perceptions, ethical sourcing and eco-label strategies. All of which can be linked to the broader theme of SDG12: Responsible Production and Consumption. Thus, the book not only has a wide geographical scope but also brings together a collection of scholars spanning many disciplines such as marketing, management, textiles, fashion, economics, and digital media. Offering a combination of empirical and conceptual works, the book also provides important insights for future research enquiries. 

Chapter 1 A conceptualization and review of sustainability and luxury

Navdeep K. Athwal and Claudia E. Henninger

This chapter will begin by understanding the factors underpinning sustainability from the perspective of business and also sustainable consumption. The chapter will provide an overview of the various theoretical debates regarding the legitimacy and reporting of sustainability of luxury organisations. There is also an expanding body of consumer research that explores the gap in ethical intention and behaviour, where in other words, consumers are aware of the need to act more ethically in the marketplace and desire to do so, and yet they generally do not act on these desires. This chapter will provide an overview of the literature on the ethical consumption gap in a luxury context. The authors have identified that body of work loosely takes four streams; 1- the impact of social desirability whereby consumer participants respond to research in a way that they consider as socially acceptable; 2- ethical consumption intentions are genuine, yet this does not translate to actual behaviour due to external factors; 3-  studies that explore the multiple and often competing consumer identities which impede their intentions to consume ethically; and 4- literature stream examines the strategies that consumers use to justify the gap in their behaviour.

Keywords: sustainability, luxury, consumer attitudes, behaviour

PART 1: BUSINESS PERSPECTIVES AND STRATEGIES

Chapter 2 The hidden value of second-hand: Exploring the levels of second-hand integration as part ofbrand strategy  

Linda Lisa Maria Turunen, Aalto University  

Designer-led fashion brands with high quality are desired in extensively growing second-hand market. The contributors for extensive growth of resale apparel market can be pointed out: first and foremost, the consumers, who organically are taking steps towards extending the lifecycle of their used products through selling. Secondly, the emerging companies, who tap into this market and bring value for consumer-to-consumer transactions, either by bringing easiness to find, convenience for selling and purchasing process and/or trustworthiness for transactions between consumers. Further, all of this can be seen to fit into the bigger trend of sustainability, which has positively boosted the social acceptance around second-hand consumption. One would expect that the designer-led fashion brands to be eager to engage in the second-hand market to control the brand’s image, make profits and enhance sustainability perception. Despite the second-hand activities are steadily growing, many brands seem to have left the market of their desired treasures for third parties. The chapter examines second-hand market from brand perspective and shed light on what kinds of opportunities the second-hand market could bring for the luxury- and designer-led premium brands, and what are perceived as the current hindrances to develop the resale business under the brand.  The chapter will proceed as follows: First alternative paths of integrating second-hand activities under the brand will be explored. The level of integration of second-hand activities varies extensively from non-existent (resale activities acknowledged, but second-hand player stays separate and disconnected from the brand) to collaborative (two-way benefits for brand and second-hand actor) to full integration (second-hand activities organized as part of the brand’s offerings). The second-hand markets’ opportunities and challenges for designer-led fashion and luxury brands will be examined in greater detail by reviewing and analyzing the alternative models in the light of supporting empirical interview data collected from company representatives. Finally, the chapter will conclude the alternative ways of incorporating and utilizing second-hand market as a part of brand building of luxury- and designer-led premium brands. 

Chapter 3 Sustainability in the men’s luxury footwear sector: A case study of R.M. Williams 

Taylor Brydges^1,2, Claudia E Henninger³, Mary Hanlon^4,5, Lisa Heinze⁶, Monique Retamal² 

¹Department of Human Geography, Stockholm University 

²Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology Sydney 

³Department of Materials, University of Manchester 

⁴Kwantlen Polytechnic University, Canada 

⁵Okanagan College, Canada 

⁶ Department of Gender and Cultural Studies, University of Sydney, Australia 

Sustainability is a growing concern in the fashion industry, of which the luxury market is no exception. In this chapter, we investigate one sub-sector of the luxury market: men’s luxury footwear, exploring the relationship between quality, luxury, and sustainability. Grounded in a broader research project on the Australian fashion industry, we offer a case study of Australian luxury leather boot brand R.M. Williams. R.M. Williams positions itself as a global luxury footwear brand representing not only Australia but the Australian outback. The company's international appeal and global success story appear tied to its brand identity, imbued with a connection to land and “tradition” claims which the company implies are supported through a commitment to its history and trademarked craftsmanship but have been called into question during a period of expansion in recent years. Through tracing the history of R.M. Williams, we explore key tensions pertaining to sustainability and luxury in the global fashion and apparel industry, including place-based reputations of quality and traditional craftsmanship.  We investigate the ways in which commitments to, and perceptions of, quality -- at the core of this brand -- have evolved over time. When smaller heritage brands are purchased by multinational fashion conglomerates, tensions between a brand’s identity and appeal under the ethos of sustainable luxury and strategies of cost-cutting and offshore production (designed to increase scalability) come into play, drawing further into question different understandings related to notions of “luxury” and “sustainability”. 

 Key words: Luxury, sustainability, quality, footwear, Australia 

Chapter 4 Towards Circular Luxury Entrepreneurship –A Saudi Female Entrepreneur Perspective

Rana Alblowi, Princess Nourah Bint Abdul Rahman University 

Academics are in agreement that the environmental and societal impacts of consumption are in urgent need of far more attention and need examining in relation to more diverse markets. Owing to the significant cultural, economic, environmental, social and competitive shifts in luxury and sustainability as well as the Vision 2030, the industry and consumers are focusing more on the concept of sustainability. One of the objectives of the Vision 2030 relates to the social and environmental sustainability of the fashion industry and brand development together with the supply chain of the circular economy. As a result of Government guidance and due to mounting pressure to implement sustainable development, a number of new luxury entrepreneurs are developing extraordinary perspectives in regards to sustainable development. Consequently, they are breaking the traditional business innovation that the luxury sector is familiar with and are applying the concept of sustainable development with respect to their business strategies. Furthermore, they are developing a circular economy so that ‘sustainability’ is a major part of their respective supply chains. Even though fostering entrepreneurship is a crucial strategy to achieving the country’s vision, in Saudi Arabia, luxury entrepreneurs are facing numerous challenges to integrate sustainability and brand development into their work and redesign their supply chain for the circular economy. Nevertheless, it is worth stating that it is still not completely apparent to what extent luxury and sustainability can be coordinated and what the opinions of luxury entrepreneurs really are concerning sustainability. Consequently, it is essential to determine how important luxury brands consider sustainability to be and also determine how much awareness they have on the topic. Similarly, it is crucial to explore the role of sustainability in the plans adopted by brands along the entire luxury supply chain. As a consequence of the global impact that the luxury industry is having, its own interest in sustainability, and increasing academic interest in this particular area, we combine the current work on sustainable‐luxury marketing with the intention of discussing important challenges in this area. This chapter will highlight the significant challenges and opportunities for luxury sustainability in the fashion industry and to focus on possible approaches to products and brand management in conjunction with the most extensive possible range of luxury goods and services. Furthermore, in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with Saudi female entrepreneurs as suppliers and how this influences supply chain management within the context of the fashion industry. This chapter will analyse how sustainability and the principles pertaining to a circular economy are changing the awareness of the fashion world among the new female luxury entrepreneurs in Saudi Arabia and pursuit of national agenda of achieving the Kingdom’s Vision 2030.

Keywords: Saudi Arabia, entrepreneurship, Vision 2030, culture, sustainability, luxury

Chapter 5 Sustainable supply chain process of Kente textile: introducing heritage into the sustainability framework 

This chapter is focuses on Kente textiles as a form of jewellery. Kente is a heritage handwoven textile which is made in Bonwire. Bonwire is a small community in Ghana and it is the home of this heritage where everyone in the community is involved in the textile production process in one way or another. This form of textile production has been going on for over 300 years, which makes Kente a very important textile in Ghana. This chapter seeks to consider the production process of the Kente textiles and if the visual identity of the finished product communicates that these jewellery items have been produced in a more sustainable manner. We explore whether and how heritage could be included in the sustainability framework, as heritage focuses on traditions and/or objects of value from the past that have been preserved and made relevant for present/future generations. Thus, this research focuses on the following research question: 

How can sustainability in the production process and ecosystem in more general terms (heritage approach) be visualised in the product?  

This chapter is part of a wider project and draws on an extensive literature review, as well as content analysis of visual materials. It carefully hones in on the documented production process, as well as comments that are made about the Kente jewellery on the Bonwire heritage website.  Content analysis will be used to analyse the articles and secondary resources.   

Findings thus far have revealed a sense of belonging that is communicated through the Kente jewellery. It seems that there is a difference between in-groups and out-groups, which implies that the Kente jewellery highlights the journey an individual has made to anyone, who is familiar with the culture, and thus also the production process. From an outsider’s perspective, the Kente jewellery, might simply be associated with it being a piece of jewellery. An aspect that will be further explored throughout the chapter.    

Keywords: Kente, production process, visual identity, sustainability, heritage, jewellery 

PART 2: SUSTAINABILITY LUXURY CONSUMPTION

Chapter6 Cultural view on sustainable fashion 

Stephanie Yesmukanova, Marian Makkar, Diane Martin, Francis Farrelly, RMIT University, Australia 

Fashion as one of the most resource-intensive industry has recently seen a shift in trends toward more sustainability. At the same time, it is still dominated by unsustainable practices with environmental efforts being multiple but small in the market share. From the demand perspective, few luxury consumers walk their talk on ethical issues: when shopping for luxury, only some individuals prioritize sustainability in their purchase decisions that corroborate their claims in the importance of going green. As a result, aesthetics trumps ethics, especially when it comes to making fashion choices. There are many ways to study these behaviours, and one perspective that tends to be omitted is the cultural and symbolic aspects of consumption. Scholars agree that luxury is highly symbolic and aspirational by nature. Yet it still stays unclear what symbols and meanings sustainability bear, especially in the context of sustainable fashion. This chapter looks at the role of culture in both luxury and sustainability and provides an explanation of its value from a theoretical understanding and provides managerial implications in the field of sustainable fashion.  

Keywords: luxury, sustainability, ethics, consumers

Chapter 7 Sustainability, Saudi Arabia, and Luxury Fashion Context – An oxymoron or a new way? 

Sarah Ibrahim Alosaimi, Department of Fashion and Textile Design, Faculty of Art and Design, Princess Nourah Bint Abdul Rahman University 

This conceptual chapter aims to explore the meaning of sustainability and sustainability practices in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) through the Vision 2030 with a particular focus into luxury fashion. The KSA is a major Islamic developing country that has been growing dramatically over the past two decades (Abuljadail and Ha, 2019). Its luxury market worth $14.5 billion in 2018 and is forecasted to hit more than $22.2 billion by the end of 2024 (Research and Markets, 2019). Consumption of luxury goods is a conservational issue in Islam, because Muslims are supposed to live thoughtful lives, whereas luxury fashion brands have long been related to extravagance (Ashraf et al., 2017). However, the KSA seems to be one of the largest luxury consumer market, where the average customer in the KSA spends more than two times as much on fashion as the average consumer in China (McKinsey & Company, 2020). Saudi consumers are treating luxury fashion like fast fashion (Assomull, 2020). Particularly, Millennials are regarded, in fact, as material collectors (Sadekar, 2020). Therefore, the luxury consumption rate of the KSA has been high, and thus the country faces significant luxury fashion consumption challenges today despite the fact that Saudi government has adopted different efforts to promote sustainability through the Vision 2030, which was introduced in 2016. The Vision 2030 was adopted as a roadmap that guide the KSA to create a more diverse and sustainable economy, safeguard the environment by increasing the efficiency of waste management, establishing comprehensive recycling projects and reducing different types of pollution. In doing so, the country attempt to preserve environment and natural resources, and fulfil Islamic, human and moral duties (Vision2030, 2016). Unlike developed countries where sustainability development and practices have been included in their policies for a number of years, thereby consumers aware of sustainability issues and have a more positive attitude towards it; in the KSA, like any other developing countries, the situation is different where the integration of sustainable development remains low, and thus authorities face major challenges in the adoption of sustainable development, including a lack of stakeholder interest and public awareness (Dekhili et al., 2019). This makes the KSA an interesting context since there seem to be high luxury consumption, yet sustainability has recently become such a huge theme that government is trying to pursue. Therefore, the meaning of sustainability in this context needs to be further explores because there seem to be a paradox between the government growing expectation on improving sustainable development and luxury consumers’ consumption practices. This chapter is likely to contribute to the sustainable luxury consumption literature in developing countries. 

Key Words: Luxury fashion, Sustainability, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Vision 2030 

Chapter 8 Sustainable luxury fashion – insights from Chinese consumers

Jiahui Hu & Claudia E Henninger

Department of Materials, University of Manchester, Sackville Street Building, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL 

Sustainability is intuitively understood, yet also debated as to what it means, especially when it comes to the luxury fashion context. Whilst at times seen as an oxymoron, in that luxury and sustainability cannot go hand in hand, there have been recent changes in that luxury fashion retailers are increasingly pushing the angle of sustainability. Yet, what is currently unknown is how this is perceived by Chinese luxury consumers. What do they understand as being sustainable and what are they expecting form sustainable luxury fashion companies?  This gap is addressed within this chapter, by exploring consumer perceptions of what sustainability means within the context of Chinese consumers and luxury fashion.  

Key words: sustainability, perceptions, China, Chinese luxury consumers

Chapter 9 Sustainable eco-luxury in the Scandinavian context 

Kirsi Niinimäki, Associate Professor, Aalto University, Finland 

This chapter approaches an understanding of sustainable luxury through a case study done in Finland. The case study consists of a small consumer study and an industry case where textile/clothing factory is strongly investing in sustainable alternatives in the industrial practices.  

Scandinavian lifestyle is well known of eco values, appreciation of pure nature and slow living. Many Scandinavian countries want to be the global leaders in the climate change, e.g. Finland as a nation has stated to be the forerunning society in a circular economy. This value base lays the grounding for Scandinavian consumers’ understanding of luxury. Luxury is connected to sustainable values, eco-appreciation, natural-based alternatives and down to earth design. In Scandinavian context eco-luxury is not something which is meant for wealthy people alone, but more so a design which is based on ecological value base. A small consumer study was done in Finland and it showed that Finnish consumers’ define three categories in luxury; 1) everyday luxury (e.g. some service which cheers you up), 2) a bit better level e.g. in a product or service (needs some effort to be able to reach it), 3)  a lifestyle (only for view people are able to reach it). These survey results will be reflected against the industrial/business case. The company, which is well known design house, is testing plant based natural dyes in their industrial printing processes. The plant, Woad (Isatis Tinctoria) is cultivated in Finland. In this way  the design house brings following values into their design; super-locality, transparent, natural, ecological, uniqueness. The origin of this colour can be localized to the field level. While this colour source (plant based colour) availability is limited and the production (harvesting) happens only once a year, it will end up in limited edition design and new rhythm in the industry and therefore ends up in slow eco-design approach. Through this study Scandinavian sustainable luxury will be defined through industry, consumer and ecological point of views. 

Key words: Sustainable luxury, Eco-luxury, Scandinavian, Slow design, Natural dyes 

PART 3: SUSTAINABILITY COMMUNICATIONS

Chapter 10 Luxury personal care products and sustainability claims: An exploratory study of consumers’ perceptions and brand communication strategies  

Alevizou, Panayiota, University of Sheffield, Management School, Conduit Road, Sheffield, S10 1FL 

The luxury beauty sector has recently witnessed a dramatic shift, both in terms of brand innovations and consumers personal care behaviour. During the Covid-19 pandemic, consumers turned to their personal care products to promote their emotional wellbeing and brands have come forward with innovative solutions for new skincare concerns caused by the ‘new normal’ (eg. ‘maskne’, antibacterial properties, boost of Vitamin C properties etc). At the same time consumers are becoming more value oriented and are demanding more socially responsible brand behaviour (see MINTEL 2020). As a result an increasing number of independent brands, referred to as industry disrupters, have come forward with claims such as ‘health benefits’, ‘clean beauty’, ‘natural ingredients’, causing confusion in the market in terms of the meaning and the ‘true cost ofclean beauty’. Luxury brands have followed the trend reassuring the market that luxury beauty and sustainability can go hand in hand. Yet there is dearth of research focusing on luxury brands and sustainability claims and most importantly the effect of those claims on consumer behaviour and perceptions. This chapter is exploratory in nature and has a twofold aim; firstly, to evaluate the range and type of sustainability claims made by luxury beauty brands by using a social semiotics approach and secondly, to explore consumers’ perceptions of the claims. This study contributes to the longstanding debate on the effect of sustainability claims on consumer behaviour and to the contemporary discussions of what constitutes ‘clean beauty’.   

Keywords: greenwashing, clean beauty, semiotics, communication, consumer behaviour  

Chapter 11 Investigating consumer perceptions on how they perceive luxury fashion brand’s eco-labelling strategy  

This chapter explores how luxury fashion brands communicate their sustainability information with customers, by looking at their eco-labelling strategy within material innovations. Essentially, eco-labels are the explicit attribute for consumers to authenticate the sustainability claims from companies (Atkinson and Rosenthal, 2014). Rather than saying eco-labels are able to reduce asymmetry of sustainability information among organizations and consumers, there is a refutation in the academic sphere, in which eco-labelling remains intangible at point-of-sale (Davies et al., 2020). Nevertheless, utilizing eco-labels is vital for identifying the sustainable characteristic of fashion products. Thus, eco-labels can act as symbols to enable consumers to make an informed decision, in that they highlight that products may be more environmentally friendly than their counterparts. In order to enrich this research area, this study explores how consumers perceive eco-labels that are designed to visualize sustainable material innovations and thus, act as stimuli for sustainable practices. This chapter contributes to knowledge surrounding eco-labels and their perceived usefulness to effectively communicate material innovations within the luxury fashion industry. 

Keywords: Eco-Label; Material Innovations; Sustainability information; Luxury Fashion; consumer perception  

Chapter 12 Canadian Ethical Diamonds and Identity Obsession: How the concept of traceability is explained in ethical jewelry stores and how it is understood by ethical consumers in the Italian context. 

Dr. Linda Armano a post-doctoral fellow at UBC and Dr. Annamma Joy, Professor of marketing, UBC.  

Product traceability is often related to concepts such as supply chain, ethics, sustainability, transparency and informed choice. In the jewelry industry, the most well-known traceability systems in relation to gold and precious stones involve specific certification programs (e.g. Fairmined) and traceability schemes substantiated by laser engraving of logos and alphanumeric codes on stones (e.g. Canadian ethical diamonds). While most studies on the topic of traceability are concerned with the analysis of the discursive strategies of advertising campaigns on ethical jewelry, the present research, based on an ethnographic survey of jewelers and some customers, focuses on how the topic of traceability is communicated and negotiated within Italian ethical jewelry stores in Milan and Bologna. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to analyze how Canadian ethical diamond traceability information manages to appease Italian ethical consumers' uncertainty when faced with their questions about the ethics of the jewelry supply chain. To better understand how the issue of traceability is narrated by the two Italian ethical jewelers and understood by their customers, we applied Francesco Remotti's (2010) concept of "identity obsession" to our data. In particular, considering the latter concept as an indispensable element to guide consumers' ethical choices, we also used it to understand how jewelers and customers resort to the idea of identity to talk about the traceability of each and every Canadian ethical diamond.  

Chapter 13 Case Study: Positive Luxury and the Sustainable Luxury Accreditation

Navdeep Athwal, University of Leicester School of Business, Brookfield Campus, Leicester, LE2 1RQ

Positive Luxury aims to promote and advise on sustainable solutions for the often-conflicting needs of people, the environment, development and successful business in the luxury sector. The organisation recognises that luxury brands contribute to their own sustainability in different forms, so each brand is assigned a bespoke collection of “Positive Actions” that signifies their unique efforts, illustrating their sustainable and ethical business practices in a simple and consumer-friendly way. This chapter will aim to understand how the ‘Butterfly Mark’; which Positive Luxury regards as a third-party accreditation mark is awarded by luxury brands. Further, this chapter offers a depth analysis of what Positive Luxury considers as the highest standards of verified innovation and environmental performance. Finally, the chapter will explore which luxury brands have been awarded the Butterfly Mark.

PART 4: ACTIVISM

Chapter 14 ‘Take a Stand’ the Importance of Social Sustainability and its Effect on Generation Z Consumption of Luxury Fashion Brands 

Helen McCormick¹ & Pratibha Ram²

1 Manchester Metropolitan University

2 University of Manchester

1.                   What factors should brands consider while choosing a specific societal issue to act on/ against? 

2.                   How can luxury brands make a difference on important societal issues and how can they assure brand authenticity? 

This inquiry focuses exclusively on the luxury fashion sector as the field of application. Real world evidence is provided by using case studies to show the importance of social sustainability marketing in luxury fashion and implications for practice, study limitations and future research directions are discussed.  

Key words: Fashion, luxury, Social sustainability, Social sustainable consumption, Social sustainable branding, woke brands, woke consumption, brand activism. 

Chapter 15 #Halternatives – The criticism never stops

The 21^st century is dominated by technological advancements and increased media fragmentation. Consumers get their information from a variety of channels including, but not limited to Instagram, YouTube, WeChat and more. These social media channels have further fostered dialogic communication, which means consumers are no longer passive listeners, but active participants, voicing their concerns and opinions. As a result, we see a lot more activism that criticizes industry practices and actively looks for and seeks out #Halternatives. This implies consumers become more conscious of the environmental and social impacts their clothing consumption has and thus, seek information about alternatives, not only to buying first hand, but also in terms of secondhand. Yet a key question that remains is what these #Halternatives are and how successful are they in terms of influencing consumer behaviour? This chapter takes a critical stance and explores various activism movements and their impacts especially on the luxury fashion industry, which faces sharp criticism when it comes to the use of ‘luxury materials’.  

Keywords: social media, #halternative, influencers, activism, luxury, fashion

Chapter 16 The rise of virtual representation of fashion in marketing practices: How it can encourage sustainable luxury fashion consumption

Shuang Zhou

Sustainability has increasingly become a significant issue for the luxury sector and a demanding theme in luxury consumption research. The luxury fashion industry has undertaken numerous initiatives to increase sustainability by employing cutting-edge technologies to virtually represent fashion. For instance, they are taking actions to inject virtual elements into their marketing practices to reduce demands for materials, such as producing virtual items, using virtual stores, and adopting virtual reality in marketing communications to promote sustainable products (Deloitte, 2020). Previous literature on sustainable luxury fashion consumption (SLFC) mostly examined consumer motivations and perceived meanings and values concerning SLFC as well as consumer purchase of vintage, recycled, and ‘pre-loved’ luxury. However, much remains unknown about how virtual representation of fashion in marketing practices can affect consumers’ understanding and practice of SLFC, motivating this chapter to shed light on this area. This chapter adopts the perspective of consumer learning (Hoch & Deighton, 1989; Bosangit & Demangeot, 2016) to propose that a use of virtual representation of fashion could contribute to raising consumers’ awareness of SLFC through a mechanism of learning from experience (Hoch & Deighton, 1989). This chapter contributes to the literature by adopting the pragmatic learning theory (Jayanti & Singh, 2010) to develop a conceptual model to illustrate the potential relationships among the following domains: company-controlled stimuli that embed virtual format in different marketing contexts, customer experience, transformation of customer experience, self-development regarding self-concept and lifestyle, and enhanced consumer awareness of SLFC. This chapter also provides practical implications on the stimulation and encouragement of consumer sense of sustainability in luxury fashion consumption and how marketers can shape, influence, and leverage the consumer learning process concerning SLFC.

Key words: sustainable luxury fashion consumption, visual, representation, pragmatic learning

Includes case studies from the luxury sector in Finland, the UK, China, Australia, Italy, Saudi Arabia and Ghana

Captures contemporary dialogues and discourses on sustainability and luxury goods

Offering a cross-cultural perspective on a wide range of sustainability topics in the luxury sector