Why Customers Pay More for Green: The Combined Effects of Personal Norms and Attitude

Abstract

Although premium pricing is becoming more and more important in the marketing of green products, customers frequently support sustainability in general but hesitate when it comes to paying more. Using two proximal mechanisms, an internalised obligation route via personal norms and an evaluative route via attitude toward paying a premium for green products, this study explores the psychological pathways through which consumers' hedonic values influence their intention to pay more for green products. Using survey data and variance-based structural equation modelling, the results demonstrate that positive attitudes, in addition to the motivating influence of personal norms, account for the majority of customers' premium intention for green items. Although there is no direct value-to-intention connection, hedonic values reinforce attitude and personal norms but do not directly convert into premium intention. These findings imply that experiential orientations are important in green markets primarily when they are translated into (i) a resoundingly positive assessment of paying more for sustainability and (ii) a sense of self-consistent duty to support ecologically conscious products. In addition to providing practical advice for green brand positioning namely, combining experiential meaning with credible justification and identity-consistent norm cues that legitimise the price premium, the study advances the field of green pricing research by elucidating how value orientations are converted into premium acceptance.