Consumer Perception of Cotton Sustainability 

This research focuses on consumers’ perception, knowledge, preferences, and the amount of importance they place on cotton sustainability. Specifically, we developed an online survey to investigate what consumers value when making purchase decisions, consumer knowledge regarding sustainable cotton, and how accessible sustainable cotton products are for today’s consumers. We found that many of our participants were in the 18-24-year-old age range and value how their clothing is produced. This age range had the greatest knowledge regarding cotton sustainability compared to all other age ranges. 75% of the survey participants relayed that sustainable cotton is only moderately available to them when shopping. Over 50% stated that pricing strongly affects their purchase decisions. In all, our results suggest that consumers are conscious and willing to incorporate sustainability into their shopping patterns. However, price reduction and increase in availability would encourage consumers to shop even more sustainable