Marketing for Sustainable Development

5The Packaging-free Product Market: A Renewal of Practices

Maud DANIEL-CHEVER^1,, Élisa MONNOT², Fanny RENIOU¹ and Lucie SIRIEIX³

¹ CREM-CNRS, IGR-IAE Rennes, University of Rennes 1, France

² THEMA, CNRS, CY Cergy Paris University, France

³ UMR MOISA – CIRAD, University of Montpellier, CIHEAM-IAMM, INRAE, Institut Agro-IRD, Montpellier, France

5.1. Introduction

While it remains difficult to establish sustainable practices in the daily lives of individuals and their lifestyles, some trends in consumption seem to be gaining ground. This can be seen in the success of fair trade products¹, the growth of the market for organic products² and the increase in sales outlets for local products³, all driven by arguments linked, or not, to sustainability (Daniel and Sirieix 2012). These modes of sustainable consumption also include the purchase of unpackaged products (Monnot and Reniou 2012), a new way of buying that seems to have had a positive response among consumers. In France, the market on which this chapter focuses, the sales outlets for packaging-free products are multiplying, the range of products sold without packaging is growing, producers are demonstrating a great capacity for innovation and supply chains are being organized. Célia Renesson, president of Réseau Vrac (a network focused on packaging-free products), estimates that in France in 2018, the market for packaging-free products had a turnover of 850 million euros, compared to only 100 million euros in 2013⁴. While the ...