Consumer perceptions of what animal welfare messages on pork products say

Les Cahiers de l'IFIP, 8(1), 19-30
Farm animal living conditions and slaughter practices have attracted increasing consumer concern over the past decade, prompting farmed-animal commodity chains to find ways to address these new consumer expectations. In this context, we led this exploratory study to analyze consumer response to farm animal welfare-related messages on meat packaging. The aim of this study is to gain a firm understanding of the drivers and determinants—particularly surrounding farm animal welfare messages— that shape consumer purchases of meat products, in order to inform the commodity chains on actionable ways to re-adapt. The study adopted a qualitative approach and employed a two-phase method. Phase one used projective interviewing with consumers outside the act of purchase in order to understand their representations of farm animal welfare and identify the relevant-for-purpose themes to address in a second phase of the study. The themes identified served to inform interviews led in mass food retail outlets with other consumers while they were shopping in order to understand how welfare-related claims on the packaging of self-serve fresh and processed pork and chicken products actually translated into purchases made. Our results point to five consumer profiles that are stratified by the extent to which farm animal welfare shapes their purchase decisions. Our results also bring important guidance for meat-commodity management.