Market Towards Sustainable Consumption †MyAssignmenthelp.com

Question: Discuss about the Marketers are not doing enough in directing target market towards sustainable consumption. Answer: This is the world of limited resource and in this world, it is necessary that the use of resources should be minimum. Growth in such a world should be economically, socially as well as environmentally sustainable. The marketers play a major role in making the consumption of the customers sustainable (Thorpe, 2010). Sustainable consumption can be referred as the use of the product and services that have minimum impact on the environment and so that our future generation can make use of it. Sustainability in the consumption and production is very important and also act as the challenge for the marketers. Due to different forces such as government and stakeholders, pressure on the companies for being sustainable is increasing. The major challenge that has been faced by marketers is about identifying the sustainable brand and to communicate it to the consumers (Prothero, Dobscha, Freund, Kilbourne, Luchs, Ozanne and Thgersen, 2011). The company and the customers communicate and interact through theadvertising and marketing channels. Thus, marketers have the major role in maintaining the sustainability in consumption by the customers because they are the one who are responsible for attracting and forcing the customers to buy certain kinds of products. Marketers are the one who provides the information of sourcing and production o the products to the consumers and that is the only information that acts as the base for the customers to take their buying decisions. One of the major questions that arise is why there is a need for sustainability in consumption. The big reason is the urbanisation and the increasing population. More and more people are shifting from rural to urban areas, this leads to change in their demands and exploitation of the resources available (Peattie and Peattie, 2009). The rise in population also leads to over consumption of the resources as the numbers of people using the resources are increasing day by day but the resources availability is limited. It has been analysed that the marketers are not playing their role efficiently in catering the target market with the true information. There can be many reasons by marketers are not playing their role efficiently. The first reason is business. in order to enhance business the markets do not look for the sustainability aspect but market those products that are giving high profits to them without considering the harmful effects they may have on the society and the environment if they are consumed by the people (Kang, Liu and Kim, 2013). Another reason that restricts the marketers to provide the information about the sustainable consumption to the customers is the dilemma of choosing the sustainable brand from the competing brand. It is the challenge for the market to select one of the brand out of so many brands that is sustainable and using the sustainable processes and sources in production. The ever increasing demand of the people these days is also forcing the companies to make changes in the products now and then, these changes requires them to make use of the resources and exploit them (Tukker, Cohen, Hubacek and Mont, 2010). Thus, sourcing and producing the products sustainably is also very difficult for the companies. Companies are fooling the people by providing them false information through marketers regarding the process they use and the ingredients they use in producing their products. There are many false practices used by the companies an d the marketers to target the customers. Marketers try to sell more and more products to the consumers (Fedrigo and Hontelez, 2010). For customers, consumption is buying things and stuffs which lead to use of more and more resources and thus sustainability. This is a misconception in the minds of the customers that buying more things is consumption and this has been created by the marketers only. Customers think that consumption can be made sustainable only by using or buying things that are organic and not making use of more resources. However, they have to make sure that they are using the products in the amount that is enough for them and not more than that. This is because even the excessive use of sustainable products is creating and developing unsustainability in the environment (Tukker, Charter, Vezzoli, Sto and Andersen, 2008). Marketers act as the mediator between the consumers and the companies. They have the responsibility to provide correct information to the target customers by using some of the methods such s green marketing. Even inmarketing practices, the company should promote environment friendly behaviour and products. The marketers nee to boycott the products they found are unsustainable in any of the way whether it is economic, social or environmental. This discussion suggests that marketers are not playing their ole properly of creating the awareness among the customers about sustainable consumption. This is because of their greed to enhance their own business (Young, Hwang, McDonald and Oates, 2010). It is the need of hour for the marketers to realize their duty and communicate the target customers with the proper information through different medium of advertising and social media campaigns. These are the very important tools that can be sued to make the society aware about sustainability an d its importance in production and consumption. References: Thorpe, A., 2010. Design's role in sustainable consumption.Design Issues,26(2), pp.3-16. Prothero, A., Dobscha, S., Freund, J., Kilbourne, W.E., Luchs, M.G., Ozanne, L.K. and Thgersen, J., 2011. Sustainable consumption: Opportunities for consumer research and public policy.Journal of Public Policy Marketing,30(1), pp.31-38. Peattie, K. and Peattie, S., 2009. Social marketing: A pathway to consumption reduction?.Journal of Business Research,62(2), pp.260-268. Kang, J., Liu, C. and Kim, S.H., 2013. Environmentally sustainable textile and apparel consumption: the role of consumer knowledge, perceived consumer effectiveness and perceived personal relevance.International Journal of Consumer Studies,37(4), pp.442-452. Tukker, A., Cohen, M.J., Hubacek, K. and Mont, O., 2010. Sustainable consumption and production.Journal of Industrial Ecology,14(1), pp.1-3. Fedrigo, D. and Hontelez, J., 2010. Sustainable consumption and production.Journal of Industrial Ecology,14(1), pp.10-12. Tukker, A., Charter, M., Vezzoli, C., Sto, E. and Andersen, M.M., 2008.Perspectives on radical changes to sustainable consumption and production(Vol. 1). Greeenleaf Publishing. Young, W., Hwang, K., McDonald, S. and Oates, C.J., 2010. Sustainable consumption: green consumer behaviour when purchasing products.Sustainable development,18(1), pp.20-31.