Communication of Sustainable Brands within Food and Beverages : A Qualitative Study of KRAV’s CSR Communication

We are today living in a complex food system. A system interlinked by series of stakeholders who are affected by each other’s decisions. When you purchase a pack of coffee in the grocery store, your action impacts several other actors. Besides giving yourself the pleasure to consume the product, you also contribute to salaries from the farm to the store. This mean that you also contribute to employees’ healthcare throughout the supply chain. The purchase further has an impact on the environment. Our current food system is today contributing significantly to climate change and environmental degradation. At the same time, our population is increasing which mean that more people need to be fed. A sustainable development of the food system is crucial to reduce our environmental impact and still feed a growing population. Many companies are today addressing this issue by incorporating values regarding social and environmental issues. Stakeholders like consumers, employees and investors are further showing an interest in companies engaging in social and environmental issues. Thus, companies are not only addressing social and environmental dilemmas to act responsible, but also as a tool to gain business returns from its stakeholders. This research used a deductive approached to test Shuili’s et al. (2010) framework for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) communication. The framework explain how companies could maximize the business returns on their CSR communication. These business returns emerge from value gain by the companies’ stakeholders. Since stakeholder may have different interests Freeman’s et al (2018) Stakeholder Theory is used to better understand how companies can approach the relation between the company and its stakeholders. The theory is used to assess and explain the factors impacting the effectiveness of KRAV’s CSR communication. The findings from both theory and practice suggest that companies should communicate around an issue that is routed in the brand values. The study further suggest that stakeholders understand that companies have both intrinsic and extrinsic motives which should be reflected in the communication to appear authentic. Authentic communication is suggested as a key factor to resonate with the stakeholders. The study further highlights the reputation of the brand as a key factor impacting the effectiveness of the CSR communication. The results show that the reputation is built over a long period of time and can be torn down over night. Thus, companies need to work proactively with brand building activities to increase credibility of the brand. The findings finally suggest that company´s should identify the opinion leaders of their brand to improve the target audience perception of the brand. This can additional be done by leveraging employees, consumers or the supply chain as brand ambassadors