This study aims to examine the effects of eco-friendly packaging design characteristics on brand awareness and consumer behavior, focusing on Chinese and overseas coffee brands. As social concern for environmental issues and sustainability has increas...
This study aims to examine the effects of eco-friendly packaging design characteristics on brand awareness and consumer behavior, focusing on Chinese and overseas coffee brands. As social concern for environmental issues and sustainability has increased, packaging design is no longer regarded merely as a means of product protection and information delivery. Rather, it has become an important communication medium that visually conveys a brand’s environmental values and social responsibility. In particular, in the coffee market where take-out consumption has become common, packaging functions as a major contact point through which consumers directly experience a brand. Eco-friendly packaging design may therefore serve as an important factor influencing brand recognition, brand recall, purchase intention, repurchase intention, and recommendation intention.
This study theoretically examined the visual elements and design characteristics of eco-friendly packaging design and conducted a comparative case analysis of Chinese and overseas coffee brands. The case analysis focused on eight brands: four Chinese brands, namely Luckin Coffee, Cotti Coffee, Manner Coffee, and Seesaw Coffee, and four overseas brands, namely Starbucks, Dunkin’, Tim Hortons, and Costa Coffee. The case analysis examined the current status of each brand’s eco-friendly packaging design based on visual elements such as brand logo, material, form, color, graphics, and layout, as well as design characteristics such as safety, convenience, reliability, environmental friendliness, and sustainability.
For the empirical analysis, a survey was conducted among consumers with experience purchasing take-out coffee, and 501 valid responses were used for the final analysis. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS 26.0 and AMOS 23.0. Frequency analysis, reliability analysis, validity analysis, correlation analysis, regression analysis, and structural equation modeling were conducted to verify the relationships among eco-friendly packaging design characteristics, brand awareness, and consumer behavior.
The results of the study are as follows. First, eco-friendly packaging design characteristics were found to have a partially significant effect on brand awareness. Specifically, sustainability had a significant positive effect on both brand recognition and brand recall, while safety and convenience had significant effects on brand recall. However, safety, convenience, reliability, and environmental friendliness did not have significant effects on brand recognition, and reliability and environmental friendliness did not have significant effects on brand recall. This indicates that eco-friendly packaging design characteristics do not affect brand awareness uniformly, but rather have different effects depending on their sub-factors.
Second, eco-friendly packaging design characteristics were found to have a partially significant effect on consumer behavior. Environmental friendliness and sustainability had significant positive effects on consumer behavior, whereas safety, convenience, and reliability did not show significant effects. This suggests that when consumers evaluate take-out coffee packaging, they may respond more sensitively to elements that represent a brand’s environmental responsibility and sustainability practices than to basic functional elements such as safety and convenience.
Third, brand awareness was found to have a significant positive effect on consumer behavior. In particular, both brand recognition and brand recall had positive effects on consumer behavior. This finding shows that brand awareness formed through eco-friendly packaging design can be connected to consumer behavioral intentions such as purchase intention, repurchase intention, and recommendation intention.
This study is meaningful in that it analyzes eco-friendly packaging design not only from a design perspective but also from the perspectives of brand awareness and consumer behavior. In addition, by comparing the packaging design cases of Chinese and overseas coffee brands, this study presents visual, functional, and environmental factors that take-out coffee brands should consider when establishing eco-friendly packaging design strategies. The findings of this study can serve as basic data for coffee brands seeking to strengthen brand awareness and encourage positive consumer behavior through eco-friendly packaging design.