For too long, marketing has focused on firm-level choices and consumer behaviour. Sustainability challenges demand broader thinking, says Julia Fehrer.
Analysis: Marketing has a sustainability problem. Sales, profits and customer satisfaction reign supreme, but the environmental and social costs of these outcomes are often overlooked.
Marketing can't stop at promoting 'green' products. It needs to play a role in building sustainable systems of value creation, helping businesses, communities and governments reimagine how markets work.
In a recent review of sustainability research in marketing, my co-authors - professor Mark Peterson and professor Bård Tronvoll - and I identified three theories or ideas that can guide this shift.
We call them:
- service-dominant logic
- resource-advantage theory
- market shaping
These ideas can provide leaders practical ways to think beyond transactions and use sustainability as a driver of innovation and competitiveness.
More than a moral duty
'Resource-advantage theory' shows that sustainability isn't just a moral duty, but that it can give businesses a competitive edge. Firms that invest in unique sustainability strategies, like closed-loop supply chains or regenerative farming, can gain advantages over competitors.
Silver Fern Farms, one of New Zealand's largest exporters, for example, launched carbon-neutral beef and invested in advanced traceability systems, turning sustainability into a premium selling point.
Meanwhile, some of New Zealand's agritech innovators are using precision farming to reduce fertiliser use and regenerate soils. These moves aren't just about ticking regulatory boxes. They're making sustainability their brand strength.
Rethinking sustainability
Another useful lens, when it comes to rethinking sustainability in marketing, is to see markets not as fixed spaces where buyers and sellers trade, but as interdependent systems.
'Service-dominant logic' helps managers make this shift. Its central idea is that service - the use of knowledge and skills to benefit others - is the fundamental basis of exchange. Products are simply carriers of service.
For managers, this means asking: "What service are we really providing, and how can we deliver it in a way that creates sustainable value?" Instead of: "How do we sell more things?"
A washing machine, for example, is not just a product, it's a vehicle for the service of clean clothes. Thinking in this way opens the door to new, less resource-intensive business models such as product-as-a-service, repair and refill systems.
Greenbox is a good example. The company manages the full lifecycle of IT equipment. It deploys devices for clients, ensures their data is securely wiped and refurbishes and resells hardware into secondary markets.
The real value of the business is not in moving equipment, but in providing compliance for customers while keeping material in use. Clients know their data is safe, regulations are met and environmental impacts are reduced.
Challenging the norms
Perhaps the boldest idea my colleagues and I identified is 'market shaping'.
This perspective encourages marketers not just to adapt to existing markets, but to change the rules by which they operate. Markets are shaped by regulations, standards, norms and shared stories. All of these can be redesigned.
Ecostore, for instance, has advocated for new packaging standards in New Zealand, pioneering plant-based and refillable packaging options.
By changing consumer expectations and lobbying for systemic improvements in recycling infrastructure, the company is helping to reshape the rules and culture of the market.
Similarly, Māori businesses incorporate kaitiakitanga - the principle of caring for the land for future generations - into their strategies, providing models for intergenerational sustainability that challenge mainstream practices.
The role of marketing
For too long, marketing has focused on firm-level choices and consumer behaviour. But sustainability challenges demand broader thinking.
Our review of the literature sets out four priorities for the industry:
- Think in systems: Understand how sustainability transitions unfold across interconnected ecosystems.
- Expand the stakeholder lens: Recognise nature and future generations as legitimate stakeholders.
- Reframe resources: Treat sustainability capabilities as strategic assets, not just compliance measures.
- Look ahead: Move from describing today's markets to imagining desirable markets of tomorrow.
New Zealand's small, networked economy, the Māori worldview centred on intergenerational stewardship and strong civil society provide fertile ground for experimenting with new, more sustainable market designs.
Meanwhile, political policies, fragmented infrastructure and tensions between economic growth and ecological limits challenge sustainable development. But, these difficulties also create opportunities for innovation.
The research this analysis is based on was conducted by Associate Professor Julia Fehrer (University of Auckland), Professor Mark Peterson (University of Wyoming) and Professor Bård Tronvoll (University of Inland Norway).
This article reflects the opinion of the author and not necessarily the views of Waipapa Taumata Rau University of Auckland.
It was first published on New Zealand Marketing Magazine
