The wellness oasis: conceptualizing consumer wellness in a health food retailing context

Purpose – This paper aims to deepen the knowledge of consumer wellness by conceptualizing the construct in a health food retailing context. With wellness being a central theme in a health food store, this study identifies the key dimensions necessary to shape consumer wellness in this context. Additionally, it highlights the role of perceived consumer wellness and how it shapes corporate social responsibility. Methodology – The research design uses a qualitative approach. Twenty in-depth interviews involving 20 customers of five multi-branch health food retailers were carried out. Findings – Findings provide insights on the underlying dimensions of consumer wellness. Results show that the environmental, social intellectual dimensions of wellness are critical to shape the sense of wellness when visiting a health food retailer. The findings also suggest that the wellness positioning does not influence the corporate social responsibility perception. In fact, the product assortment is one of the main signal’s consumers use when inferring corporate social responsibility initiatives of a health food store. Originality/value – The main contribution of this study lies in the conceptualization of consumer wellness, a novel concept in the marketing literature, drawing on the counselling literature