Introducing reusable food packaging: Customer preferences and design implications for successful market entry

To achieve the sustainable development goals and a transition to the circular economy, we need to tackle the problem of single-use packaging. As reusable packaging options are increasingly available, both from a technical and business perspective, most studies focus on its technical and value chain aspects while largely ignoring customer perspectives. In this paper, we present results from survey data, evaluating customer preferences on reusable food packaging of 40 food product categories, controlling for shopping preferences, personal characteristics and environmental orientation. Our results inform business strategies on market entry for a wide array of food products. Support for reusable food packaging can be mainly found among younger and environmentally conscious customers, which can be identified as first-mover customer segments. Awareness of the waste problem and the environmental impact of packaging, most specifically on the issue of ‘overpackaging’ food, are shown to be positively related to interest in reusable food packaging. Promising food product markets to introduce reusable packaging are eggs, dry food products and bread-based products. Reversely, interest in reusable food packaging is low for frozen food products, even among environmentally conscious customers. We formulate recommendations for product managers, designers and policymakers, stressing the importance of social learning by showcasing successful implementations of reusable packaging in classical grocery store outlets.