Climate Labels and the restaurant industry: A qualitative study

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-2470282/v1

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Research Article

Climate Labels and the restaurant industry: A qualitative study

https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-2470282/v1

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Journal Publication

published 28 Aug, 2023

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Purpose

As the food industry accounts for more than one-third of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, it is one of the single largest contributors to climate change. Strategies for reductions of CO2e (equivalent) emissions must be put in place to regulate the impact the food systems have on the climate Environmental communication using climate labels sharing information on carbon footprints can help reduce GHGs emissions from restaurant purchases on a systemic scale.

Aim

The aim is to gain insights and study how a carbon label influences the concept of what is a climate-friendly restaurant and its capacity to bridge the gap between knowledge, awareness, and action. What are the motivations for restaurants’ employees to adopt climate-friendly behaviour? How does the use of the label influence the decision for restaurants to track their carbon footprint overtime, communicate the carbon footprint of dishes, and adapt menus to be more climate friendly?

Method

The data was collected with semi-structured interviews made with video communication with three restaurant chains all using the labels.

Analysis

The data collected via the interviews were examined using an inductive thematic analysis to identify key themes. The transcending transmission approach to communication was used to gain insights into both instrumental and constitutive communication dynamics. A s the theoretical framework, ‘symbolic interactionism’ helps untangle constitutive aspects of environmental communication surrounding climate labels to analyse the process of conceptualisation through usage, co-creation and interpretation.

Results and discussion

The analysis brought forward three main themes; First, the interactions between the scientific data accessible in the tool and the restaurants. Second, the diverse implications of sustainability marketing for motivating climate actions and what they look like. And finally, climate actions and how they are being apprehended and implemented by the restaurants. The promise of climate labels was discussed by both elaborating on sociocultural dynamics, sustainability marketing and activism forces and impulses influencing the motivations for restaurants. We then discussed the capacity to transcend information into action through collaboration, and inclusiveness to avoid greenwashing.

Conclusions

Restaurants have both a commercial interest to implement climate labels in their business as well as an intrinsic desire to be a company that take actions for the planet because of the restaurants’ employees’ convictions. However, restaurants find themselves in a tricky situation where they can be damned if they take ‘wrong’ actions that can be considered greenwashing, and damned if they do nothing. the software enables restaurants to legitimise their actions and communicate them to make them resilient and evolving.

carbon footprint

climate labelling

restaurant

climate action

environmental communication

The global Paris agreement in 2015 commits to limiting global warming to well below 2 °C compared to pre-industrial levels (UNFCCC, 2016). Collective efforts are needed to reach these ambitious goals to change the status quo and combat climate change. As the food industry accounts for more than one-third of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, it is one of the single largest contributors to climate change (FAO, 2021). The EU has come up with a Farm to Fork strategy to address this issue, introducing a labelling scheme to harmonise voluntary food labels. This is meant to ensure that the climate impact of food is addressed and communicated within the food industry and to consumers (EU, 2020). Environmental labels provide neutral information about a product or a service in terms of its impact, for instance the carbon footprint, water footprint, recyclability, or provenance (ISO 14040, 2006; IPCC, 2022; Tan et al., 2014). Climate labels contain information about the amount of Greenhouse Gases (GHGs) emitted during the production, processing, packaging and transport (ISO 14040, 2006). The efforts for a climate labelling scheme aligns with indications that labels could redefine the climate impact of the food industry (Babakhani et al., 2020; Kostova, 2019; Pulkkinen et al., 2016).

The labelling system is meant to enable restaurants and caterers to make more informed decisions to implement climate solutions to lower the environmental impact of their activities (Sherry and Tivona, 2022; Kaljonen et al., 2020). This can start by publicly reporting GHG emissions to gain a better idea of the overall climate impact, to set climate goals, and identify the GHG emissions hotspots to start reducing (Sherry and Tivona, 2022). Scope 3 GHG emissions tend to have the largest climate burden for hospitality businesses, as they include all indirect emissions that occur throughout a company’s value chain, both upstream and downstream (Sherry and Tivona, 2022; Huang et al., 2010). For example, the Scope 3 GHG emissions in food service are commonly associated with a) the agricultural activities necessary to produce the raw materials, b) the emissions from cooking the food, and c) the transport associated with the journey between the farm and the fork. When those emissions are communicated with a commonly recognised and understandable labelling system, such communication is a useful tool to connect the great diversity of actors within the food service industry (Sherry and Tivona, 2022; Kostova, 2019).

The environmental impact of food is currently largely estimated and calculated using life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology (Röös et al., 2014). Studies from Sherry and Tivona (2022) and Röös et al. (2014) examined how LCA of the food served in restaurants can inform the purchasing decisions, definition, or creation of menus. The authors highlighted that for the global warming potential of to be visualised and addressed, a necessary first step is to use Carbon Footprint (CF) data, to help build awareness and as a decision support tool.

The reasons behind the decision for food corporations to share the CF of their activity through labels are wide-ranging. From the necessity to be proactive and future-proof businesses by adopting new net zero strategies to reach the goals set in the 2030 agenda before it becomes mandatory, the willingness to set up a “green” marketing strategy to attract consumers, to educate the consumers, or for activism (, 2020; Dupuis and Schweizer, 2019; Galli et al., 2018; Tan et al., 2014). Sustainability marketing promotes sustainable products and services, encourages sustainable behaviour, and fosters critical reflection (Kemper and Ballantine, 2019).

However, it is important to note that although environment labels are helping define ‘climate-friendliness’ for consumers and to better business practices, they are also abused and have been known to lead to deception (Dupuis and Schweizer, 2019; Horne, 2009). The labels can be diverted into “greenwashing” or painting environmental “green” actions as more virtuous than they really are (Sharma and Kushwaha, 2019; Torelli et al., 2019). But generally, the use of environmental labels is a strategy and practice implemented to adapt, promote values, be coherent with today’s climate challenges, and be active or proactive to help shape and contribute to defining climate-friendliness (Delmas et al., 2019).

Science-based facts about the climate are becomingly cemented as common knowledge and that the recognition of the need to address climate change has grown in society. However, actual actions to tackle those commonly recognised issues are often lacking, creating a dichotomy between awareness and action commonly referred to as the awareness-action gap or the attitude-behaviour gap (Ágústsdóttir, 2021; Zralek, 2017; Terlau and Hirsch, 2015). Studies from Sherry and Tivona’s (2022), Babakhani et al. (2020) and Pulkkinen et al. (2015) explored reactions of consumers when faced with carbon labels (calculated with LCAs) on menus in restaurants. This highlighted that customers tend to react positively to the labels but that this initial short-term reaction needs to be supported by longer term campaigns to see carbon labelling drive future decision making (Sherry and Tivona, 2022; Babakhani et al., 2020; Darkow et al., 2015). Studies from Camilleri et al. (2018) and Feucht and Zander (2018) examined the reasons for consumers' preferences for carbon labels. They concluded that consumers tend to lack the knowledge, awareness, and tools to make the best possible climate-friendly decisions regarding their behaviour and consumption. The lack of labels and environmental information communicated in effect hinders the capacity to make informed decisions and take actions.

Especially awareness of the connection between food choices and climate impact is lacking, making it necessary for climate labels to inform consumers (Hartmann and Siegrist 2017; Leach et al. 2016; Peschel et al. 2016). Restaurants have a special capacity to create connections between stakeholders and foster productive communication (Pulkkinen et al., 2016).

1.1 Research Questions

1. What are the motivations for restaurants’ employees to adopt pro-environment behaviour with the label?

2. What potential do labels have to promote environmental awareness and action?

2.1 Transcending transmission

Environmental communication has a dual nature, both as being a platform to constitute meaning collectively to make sense of how we perceive climate-friendly behaviour in restaurants, but also as a tool to foster curiosity and discussion, in an instrumental or strategic manner to enable behavioural change (Schoeneborn and Trittin, 2013). This approach to communication has been described by Schoeneborn and Trittin (2013) as transcending transmission communication. This is defined by the fact that to lead to positive impact on the environment, communication must relate, connect, and be grounded to other issues in society and in specific settings.

The transcending transmission approach is a useful communication theory to use when observing corporate communication, public relations or marketing (Heide et al., 2018; Schoeneborn and Trittin, 2013). Ideally, this corporate communication process cannot and should not be driven only by voluntary “bottom-up” or mandatory “top-down” pressures to lead to longer lasting, stabilised, and consolidated forms of organisation and actions (Schoeneborn and Trittin, 2013, p.199). This method serves the restaurant industry specifically as intentions to take climate actions are done in a corporate setting requiring organised branding and strategic development for the wellbeing of the company and its employees. If consumers feel bad when purchasing food or fail to see the ramifications of their actions, they are less likely to change their habits (Horne, 2009). Initial reactions to environmental information might therefore be filled with frustration, stress or anger causing resistance or tensions. As further emphasised by Cox (2010), if information and knowledge is shared and built in an encouraging and constitutive manner without passing judgement on the consumer or business for making certain decisions, it is more likely to lead to positive emotions. This framing of the climate action narrative is therefore built on competing rationalities that try to reconcile the desire to do good for the planet and to maintain a profitable business. These concerns can appear as conflicting or even threatening the motivations of using labels as an environmental communication tool. However, when using the transcending transmission approach, conflicts can be embraced as an enabler and a platform to start collective interactions (Schoeneborn and Trittin, 2013). Those interactions should account for all those complex and conflicting motivations and pressures influencing how climate action based on interaction with labels is embraced or not, such as profitability, monetary, ethical, regulatory, or governmental pressures. It highlights the idea that every single action, big or small, contributes to the process of social construction and social change (Pezzulo and Cox, 2018).

2.2 Interpretative analyses

Symbolic interactionism theory can help untangle those constitutive aspects of environmental communication surrounding climate labels through its use, co-creation, and interpretation (Blumer, 1969). Visual representation and communication of environmental data using labels and what their use means for humans, and the planet, only makes sense when the parties are co-creating such meaning from interactions between the restaurants and the consumers, through interpretations, ideas, and emotions (Hansen and Machin, 2013). The interactions are assisted and enabled by environmental communication and the use of climate labels to help provide a common language to build interactions that feed the debate and drive actions to adapt what is cooked, how and why to fight the climate crisis (ibid). The labels mean nothing if they are not collectively recognised, understood, and used as an indicator or symbol for climate-friendly food.

Activities among individuals seeing the labels, discussing it, companies using the food labels, sharing information about it, and using them to communicate their own climate actions are all part of communicating with the labels and shape their meaning and application (Carter and Fuller, 2015). Those interactions occur in a specific social and cultural context. The use of the symbolic interactionism theory requires a deep grounding in sociocultural communication theory to understand the diversity and depth of the driving forces in time, and place (Craig, 1999). These socio-cultural forces can be intrinsic, coming from the individual such as values or emotions, or extrinsic, coming from outside the individual as external conditions such as regulations or a given political context (Silvi and Padilla, 2021). As a result, those sociocultural forces impact the communication processes, influencing the attitude-behaviour gap (Ágústsdóttir, 2021; Nicholls and Drewnowski, 2021; Silvi and Padilla, 2021; Knox, 2000).

3.1 Labelling, sample and interviews

The calculations are done in a web tool that enables restaurant employees to calculate themselves the climate impact of the food served by feeding information about the ingredients, production method, and country of origin. The data is retrieved from country specific databases with carbon footprint data using ISO14040 certified method for calculating LCA CO2e emissions. To communicate and contextualise what the CF means, the carbon footprint classifies dishes between three categories: Low (0.1–0.5 kg CO2e), Medium (0.6–1.5 kg CO2e), and High (1.6 + kg CO2e).

To reach the UN’s sustainability goals, WWF One Planet Plate estimates that each individual’s food-related climate impact should not exceed 0.5 kg CO2e per meal (WWF, 2021). As of 2022, an average lunch or dinner in Northern Europe has a carbon footprint of 1.7 kg CO2e (ibid.).

Three different medium restaurant chains using the labels were selected according to similar size. The data was collected with four semi-structured interviews made with video communication, with a particular focus on online data gathering (Gray et al., 2020).

3.2 Analysis

As the data collected via the interviews is of a qualitative nature, we examined them using an inductive thematic data driven analysis (Nowell et al., 2017; Burnard et al., 2008). In the first stage, all the raw interviews are organized as one body of data for familiarity and initial feature extraction (Nowell et al., 2017, p.5). In the second phase, initial codes are generated to simplify and focus on specific characteristics (ibid.). In the third phase, codes related to similar concerns and ideas are condensed into central recurring subthemes (or categories), (ibid.). These subthemes are finally grouped into the essential relevant topics of the study.

The inductive thematic analysis helped identify patterns of three main recurring themes arising from the interviews and observations:

The interactions between the scientific data and the restaurants.
The diverse implications of sustainability marketing for motivating climate action
Climate actions and how they are being implemented by restaurants.

4.1 Scientific data interactions

The tool was designed for restaurant employees, chefs, and other food service providers to be able to generate the CF of their food by entering a few information about their ingredients in the tool; quantity, number of servings, country of origin and production method. The user-friendliness of the application was recognised by all participants as they discussed its accessibility and that one does not require previous knowledge to be able to calculate CF. One person shared their own experience of using the app to calculate the CF of recipes as follows:

“I think it has improved a lot over the years. And it's becoming more and more user friendly. I think it's a very easy tool to use. And it goes super-fast to put in recipes once you understand also quite what are the most important ingredients that you fill into the app”.

Another establishment mentioned that although they may change suppliers, their menus and recipes are not changing that much, meaning that their experience of the tool will be lesser compared to restaurants with seasonal menus and other environmental goals in place that push them to reassess their resource management more often. However, when asked what her own experience with the app was, she voiced it left a significant impression on her:

“Yeah, I did use the tool. I did in the beginning, for example, try to swap out falafels with our tempura shrimps, and it was like, mind-blowing, to see what a difference it makes. And that's also like, just by doing small tricks, you can actually reduce the impact on the environment a lot. I think that's amazing.”.

According to the interviews, although there are some limitations to the interactions of individuals with the scientific data, the capacity of the label to connect individuals to climate information without requiring previous knowledge brings people closer to the issue of climate change and excited about possible actions to take.

It was brought up that the label is not a traffic light system with red, orange, and green that tells people what is “good” or not. It is a more neutral communication system informing about the CF of dishes in a manner that encourages reflection and flexibility to choose meals higher or lower depending on what you choose to eat within a recommended carbon budget (cf. Figure 1).

Some of the restaurants shared that they have internal reflections and discussions based on their calculation and how to make concrete changes to their menus to reduce their CF, and external talks with their clients to see how they respond to the labels. Most participants emphasised that having open, trusting, and reliable communication is necessary for long-lasting, meaningful, and collaborative use and implementation of the labels. This open process was considered by the participants as a gateway to getting more and more people curious about how to reduce their emissions. The restaurants pointed out that it is not easy, but crucial to have restaurants’ management engaged, thinking, and included in the climate conversation.

The Operational and Sustainability Manager (OSM) and the Executive Chef (EC) shared their own experience of approaching environmental communication not through preaching, but with efforts and actions put in place to make people more environmentally aware in the restaurant and its management. In their own words about using the labels:

I really like how it is now. Not so much pointing fingers, but reaching out with kind of “here is the information available”. Of course, nudging is also something that affects people a lot. But, I think good and reliable information that is available for most people, that's kind of the way I hope the communication can be.

Most interviewees mentioned asking questions about the scientific data, regulations, best behaviours, and the climate in general, interrogations that help develop the environmental knowledge and awareness. This dynamic was recognised repeatedly during the interviews as helping inform decisions and the behaviour of all actors. Here, the role of communication is perceived by the interviewees as not only a means for informing decisions, but an opportunity to co-create and recreate the ‘rules’ of communication, which is based on trust, not passing judgement and learning together how to best raise awareness to help reduce GHG emissions.

The importance of communication around the labels was repeatedly emphasised and encouraged. This was highlighted both as internal dialogue within restaurant management, and externally to share their efforts and work with their clients, to make their business more climate friendly. All three restaurants are providing information about the labels and creating platforms to discuss their commitments with their employees and customers. However, this is done at different levels.

The need to have an assigned “champion” which stood out as perhaps being the most influential in having fruitful and constructive exchanges of ideas or visions. If there is not a person who is passionate about taking climate action and sees the potential in implementing transparency and CF reductions, it is a lot more difficult for the labels to build climate awareness and actions. It is difficult to not only get consumers interested and excited about but to keep restaurants’ management engaged, ensuring lasting efforts over time with for instance tracking and reporting the CF of food. A marketing assistant (MA) emphasised this struggle of balancing climate interest and passion with daily tasks and other responsibilities which can limit commitments:

I think, when we just got the labels, at least me, I was very excited about it. After we got it implemented, put the labels on the menus on the website, did the social media post, then you have a lot of other partners, a lot of other stuff you're working with. It hasn't been an area of focus for me as much as I wanted it to be.

During the interviews, an increased and ongoing interest for environmental efforts emerged. For instance, restaurants talked about their efforts to reduce food waste and packaging waste, adapting their supply chain to support local and smaller producers, as well as getting more involved with labelling. Although the intentions are encouraging and having a climate champion is a useful tool, keeping the interest is difficult. Many companies start with the basic package to calculate the CF of their dishes and share them with their guests, but it requires deeper interest and environmental ambitions to start tracking the climate impact through reports.

4.2 Legitimising decisions in restaurants

The participants specified that the tool provides visibility of the climate impact of food for restaurants, but that climate change is a big, intimidating, complex and intangible issue. The labels are used as an entry point for visualising and raising awareness and taking first steps. For instance, the CF calculations was in one establishment employed as as a strict guideline of what will be on the seasonal menus When asked about how this knowledge and contact with the data impacted her and her willingness to act, one responder said:

And it also made it possible for us because, without the label, we never could do this by ourselves. And then we learn more about it. And then we really got down to work with it and to make our menu climate friendly. And then, of course, now we're kind of on the right tracks and it is easier.

However, even though employees can be excited about climate actions and learning more, being transparent and accountable, the reality of taking those decisions to act for businesses is intimidating. During the interviews, the restaurants’ employees voiced this concern that the economic survival of the restaurants is very important and that making big managerial decisions beyond sharing the CF on menus can depend on convincing the owners and other stakeholders:

“I mean, I look forward to the motivation (for climate action) growing and solidifying in future. But again, the caveat to that is the fact that the restaurant business is in tatters at the moment, post-COVID. So, it's very hard to find the right resources now, for restaurants”.

Beyond efforts to limit negative climate impact, economic and social considerations must also be met. Restaurant management want to make sure that changes will truly have an impact on the planet while preserving taste and providing added value for consumers.

4.3 Sustainability Marketing motivating climate actions

A strong motivation for the restaurants to calculate and communicate the CF of their food is being able to show that they are “doing the right thing” by acting for the environment. The restaurants have a desire to build a reputation as climate-friendly and accountable businesses. an environmentally friendly image as well as ‘walk the talk’ and take concrete actions to help the environment. As the MA expressed about the importance of climate action for their restaurant:

“It's not a question to need to work with sustainability in some way. And again, I think you really need to integrate it into your core business, not just having it as an add on. Because for me, that just becomes kind of greenwashing. And that's definitely not what we want to do.”.

With the constant risk of being branded as greenwashers, interviewees were adamant that credibility is central to their branding as well as ethos for how they run their restaurant. They shared that this credibility is largely built through transparency, accountability, and adapting to new scientific knowledge and regulations. It appeared that the desire for the restaurants to market themselves as climate-friendly might be the most important factor. Labelling tools help decisions in advance of future legal requirements and market changes, to ensure that a business will remain resilient. Many pointed out that implementing climate solutions now is a prerequisite to survive in the future. Top-down CF regulation pressures are coming, as well as public opinion of corporate climate efforts becoming louder and more critical. In her own words, One MA expressed:

“You can see it on the political side, you can see it from the consumer side. So for me, it's like, it's not a question that you need to work with sustainability in some way.“.

It was clear that taking pre-emptive measures for future regulations and aligning with global climate goals is a strong and growing concern, also to differentiate the brands and gain a competitive advantage.

Regarding the first research question to identify the motivations to adopt climate-friendly behaviour with labelling, the inductive thematic analysis showed that those motivations are diverse and depend on intrinsic and extrinsic forces and conditions affecting restaurants. Those influences are developed through interactions, dialogue as well as socio-cultural dynamics that ground our relationship with food within greater underlying forces, from inner values and emotions to wider social norms or regulations. For the second research question concerning the power of the label on the restaurants’ decision to track and communicate the carbon footprint of dishes, and adapt menus to be more climate-friendly, the analysis showed that those measures depend on the capacity to turn knowledge into awareness and action. Bridging the attitude-behaviour gap by influencing perceptions and managerial shifts is a complex process that depends on a myriad of factors which evolve with time, incentives, experience, and interactions.

5.1 Motivations to adopt climate-friendly behaviour

The interviews showed that the motivation to adopt labels to improve restaurants’ practices and become more transparent about their CF was influenced by two main factors; the intention to implement sustainability marketing and an intrinsic desire to do good. By choosing to start working with labelling and sharing the impact of the served food, restaurants are contributing and redefining their role. They can diversify their offer from simply serving food to also recognising the climate change as problematic, and position themselves as taking climate action.

The motivation to work with labels can be explained by sociocultural dynamics that influence our connection to food according to our values, traditions, and emotions (Ágústsdóttir, 2021; Nicholls and Drewnowski, 2021); Knox, 2000). The observed duality in motivation findings concurs with those of previous studies that found that motivations to use climate labels was both “forced” and coming from an intrinsic desire to preserve the planet (Silvi and Padilla, 2021; Koch, 2020). The way in which communication and interactions impact the restaurant industry can be seen as creating new norms and shaping society (Carter and Fuller, 2015). Similarly, the motivations highlighted in previous studies ranged from the necessity to be proactive and future proof businesses before it becomes mandatory, the willingness to manage reputations, attract and retain consumers, and educate them (Koch, 2020; Dupuis and Schweizer, 2019; Galli et al., 2018; Tan et al., 2014). Behavioural and lifestyle changes are indispensable if we want to reach the Paris Agreements (IPCC, 2022). Although activist brands help shape climate action, facade efforts with no intrinsic motivations behind them do not lead to the same results as passionate and excited efforts (Cox, 2010).

5.2 From communication to action

The exposure to labels does not necessarily lead to climate awareness and action within the restaurants, but it helps bridge the attitude-behaviour gap. The user friendliness of the tool assist restaurant employees in connecting with the impact of food. Abusing climate-friendliness claims come at great costs for companies (Dupuis and Schweizer, 2019; Horne, 2009).

Gaining first-hand experience with the label helps participants recognise that small changes do not have to be intimidating or scary and can lead to positive impacts for the planet. Camilleri et al. (2018) and Feucht and Zander (2018) elaborated that consumers tend to lack the knowledge, awareness, and tools to make the best possible climate-friendly decisions, lowering their confidence to act. Given the right information and tools, restaurants do take actions to “‘boost’ consumer decision-making by providing relevant skills, knowledge, and decision tools” (Camilleri et al., 2018, p.53). Additionally, the findings of Hartmann and Siegrist (2017), Leach et al. (2016), Peschel et al. (2016) about the boundaries between customers' awareness and action in the food industry coincided with our observations at the restaurants’ level. Although restaurants have a significant potential for CF reduction and are a meaningful platform for climate action, they often lack the tools to inform and justify their managerial decisions and turn good intentions for the environment into fully formed, lasting and effective climate actions. their Most interviewees recognised the challenge of taking an initial interest for climate actions, and turning it into much larger systemic changes, but highlighted the power of having a climate champion and genuine interest and intrinsic desire to do good as great starting points. The climate champion has a significant scientific and emotions impact on the conversations within the restaurants. Ágústsdóttir (2021) sees this connection as helping make climate awareness and action part of a new socio-cultural norm as it then becomes part of corporate identity. Interactions and communication between the different actors in the restaurant industry help co-create the meaning of climate action and emotionally connect the scientific knowledge to the actors’ climate awareness, defining what it means to take climate actions in specific socio-cultural context.

The gap between knowledge and action was also combated in the restaurants with the development of wider conversations around the labels through creating platforms for employees and customers to come face to face with the climate data in some form. This has taken the shape of having the labels visible on the menus, having environmental training for the employees, sharing articles about their work in employee magazines et.c.. The need to have communication around the labels and the way this is done not only impacts the capacity to reduce emission, but the depth to which climate decisions can turn into systemic changes at the restaurants’ level. The results of this study confimrs that the global demand for more knowledge, information, debates, and actions to address the climate crisis requires systemic and harmonised communication from corporations (Godeman, 2013).

Regarding the use and abuse of the climate labels, our findings showed that the restaurants generally have a desire to do good as well as show it. This tend to limit the risk to be deceptive that Dupuis and Schweizer, (2019) and Horne (2009) defined as claiming that “green” actions are better for the environment than then really are. This duality of motivation mentioned earlier seems to provide strong grounds to design credible actions that evolve and adapt with time. In the context of this study, greenwashing was recognised by participants as both an issue to avoid at all costs due to both their personal desire to help the planet and to ensure that the restaurant does not get a bad reputation that would hurt it (Torelli et al., 2019). In this context, the risk of greenwashing can be perceived as a motivation causing a reaction or response for restaurants to start taking action (ibid.). If the intention is to run their restaurants with good and transparent environmental performances, greenwashing is less likely to occur (Delmas et al., 2019).

In summary, the paper found that restaurants have an interest to implement carbon labels in their business for the survival of their companies now and in the future, as well as an intrinsic desire to be a company acting for the planet because of convictions. However, restaurants find themselves in a tricky situation where they can be condemned if they take action that is considered unproper or greenwashing, and condemned if they do nothing. An independent label gains value as a tool that enables restaurants to legitimise their positive climate actions in a resilient and evolving way

Solutions to address the climate impact of the restaurant industry have to be multiple and reflect the complexity and diversity of the actors who shape it. They can ensure that climate actions are most adequate and effective in place, essentially defining a climate friendly restaurant.

Conflict of Interest

The authors report no conflict of interest.

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No competing interests reported.

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Climate Labels and the restaurant industry: A qualitative study

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Abstract

Purpose

Aim

Method

Analysis

Results and discussion

Conclusions

Figures

1. Introduction

2. Theory

3. Methods

3.1 Labelling, sample and interviews

3.2 Analysis

4. Results

4.1 Scientific data interactions

4.2 Legitimising decisions in restaurants

4.3 Sustainability Marketing motivating climate actions

5. Discussion

5.1 Motivations to adopt climate-friendly behaviour

5.2 From communication to action

6. Conclusion

Declarations

References

Additional Declarations

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Journal Publication

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