Farmer consumer partnerships
WP4
Elaboration and test of new communication arguments (responsible partner: UNIVPM): Tasks are a national public call to advertising companies for the production of communication tools (e.g. leaflets, bills and product labels) using the most promising national CSR arguments of WP 3. In the next stage three to six of the best national proposals will be tested in each country by Focus Group Discussions (three focus groups per country) to find out the most promising for each country. A recall-test by telephone with the participants of the Focus Group Discussions ten days after the discussions will identify participants’ recollection of the main CSR arguments and therefore help to choose the most promising proposals.
Deliverable 3: Report on the results of WP4
Naspetti, S. and Zanoli, R. (2010): Elaboration and test of new communication
concepts. CORE Organic Project Series Report,
Executive Summary
A national public call to advertising companies for the production of a communication tool (product label) was used to test for the most promising national organicPlus arguments of WP 3 (Animal Welfare, Local Food Production and Fair Price) through Focus Group (FG) discussions (three FGs per country). Both FGs (consumer jury) and questionnaires were used to capture the variability of consumer reactions to the communication tools in the five different EU countries: Austria (AT), Germany (DE), Italy (IT), Switzerland (CH) and the United Kingdom (UK).
The organicPlus arguments were expressed in words, symbols and pictures on the egg labels. Later, to measure the effectiveness of the labels, a total of 18 FG discussions were held to investigate the consumer attitudes and preferences towards the advertising labels. To test the different egg labels, the consumer juries discussed the labels, after which the participants were asked to fill in individual questionnaires. These were designed to measure participant reactions and responses to the label arguments and their general attitudes towards advertising (Purvis and Mehta, 1995). After ten days, telephone interview were carried out that were designed to measure the participants’ recall of the labels. Five different measures were used in the questionnaires to evaluate participants’ attitudes towards the egg labels: emotional quotient (label liking), believability, effectiveness (willingness to buy), and recall, and a general measure of attitude towards advertising was also used.
Only organic egg consumers and buyers of organic eggs, as either regular or occasional, were included into the survey sample.
Although the intention of this advertising label test was to examine the organicPlus arguments via a common communication tool, the results provide a particularly dissimilar picture of participants’ attitudes towards the egg labels across the five different EU countries. Although previously tested and selected by the research teams, the label layout, the graphical elements, and the colour of the labels were widely discussed by the FG participants. Most participants disliked the layout. This negative perception towards all of the labels could have biased the organicPlus argument perception analyses. What is quite clear that arose from the CH and DE discussions was that participants did not like to be emotionally touched by the labels/ arguments. The only particular wording that the participants from all of the countries liked to see on the labels was: ‘6 fresh organic free-range eggs’, which made them trust the quality of the eggs.
The bad perception of the labels is confirmed by the emotional quotient and believability measurements of the organicPlus arguments. In some cases, translation issues and label style were the reasons behind the participants’ bad opinions about the labels: many of the participants emphasised the unprofessional styles of the labels.
Animal Welfare was the most liked argument. Local Food Production was generally scored second. Fair Prices showed the lowest scores. Particularly in DE and CH, the participants complained about the lack of relevant information versus “empty and meaningless” label claims. Despite the generalised low level of liking of the labels, one communication concept (headline, body copy, and related symbols) for each argument was preferred (or less disliked) in all of the countries. Animal Welfare 1 was preferred to Animal Welfare 2, Local Food Production 1 to Local Food Production 2, and Fair Price 1 to Fair Price 2 (see Appendix A for description of the headlines and body texts).
In summary, most consumers:
• are not happy to ‘support’ farmers;
• are ready to treat cows “with love and care”, but cannot associate strong emotional bonds to hens;
• are not happy with vague and overblown statements (100% organic), in all of the countries except IT;
• need to associate the term ‘local’ with a specific place;
• cannot positively associate the term ‘tradition’ with primary production, but only with processing methods.
The results support the use of a green label for organic egg packaging, while care needs to be taken with the addition of any extra organicPlus claims. Labels naively appealing to emotions were not accepted in most of the countries under scrutiny, while pure price information is not enough to promote some arguments, especially the Fair Price one, if the consumer cognitive dissonance is too high.