Factors Influencing Sustainable Purchasing Behaviour of Remanufactured Robotic Lawn Mowers

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

I appreciate the opportunity to review this paper. I am impressed by the great initial idea of the study, but would like to suggest avenues for improvement as outlined in the following.

While the original idea is promising, the biggest flaw of the paper is a strong need for the authors to better contextualize their study and understand that this study is a very specific case study which focuses on remanufactured robotic lawn mowers only. This is particularly important as the survey was published in a closed Facebook group targeting Husqvarna robotic lawn mowers users, with a mainly male sample. Thus, the findings cannot simply be generalized to all remanufactured products or all sustainable purchases. This paper has various sections, including title, abstract, discussion of results and implications/ conclusions that need to be rewritten to better reflect this. Again, findings from a case study like this are interesting, however cannot lead to assumptions about the general public.

In line with this major concern, I would further like to encourage the authors to cite their sources and literature more specifically and carefully. For example, the authors state the general sentence that “customers who are less aware of remanufactured products might believe that they have a short life or are of lower quality”. While awareness does not always translate into perceptions of quality, this cited study was very specifically focused on automotive parts in a specific market (India) and can likewise not be generalized. Another example includes generic or vague statements which shall be avoided, such as “have found positive links between knowledge and another dependent variable that eventually result in sustainable purchasing behaviour”. What other variables? Be specific.

Further, the authors state that more insight is required into the consumer’s willingness to engage in sustainable purchasing behaviour. While this may be true, there is already a plethora of research published on various sustainable and green purchases in the consumer behavior field that the authors fail to cite and may wish to include. The citations below may provide a starting point for expending the reviewed literature:

Wei, C. F., Chiang, C. T., Kou, T. C., & Lee, B. C. (2017). Toward sustainable livelihoods: Investigating the drivers of purchase behavior for green products. Business strategy and the environment, 26(5), 626-639.

Haws, K. L., Winterich, K. P., & Naylor, R. W. (2014). Seeing the world through GREEN-tinted glasses: Green consumption values and responses to environmentally friendly products. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 24(3), 336-354.

Shabnam, S. A. A. D. I. A. (2013). Proposed model for predicting environmental purchase behavior of consumers. European Academic Research, 1(4), 444-466.

White, K., MacDonnell, R., & Dahl, D. W. (2011). It's the mind-set that matters: The role of construal level and message framing in influencing consumer efficacy and conservation behaviors. Journal of Marketing Research, 48(3), 472-485. https://doi.org/10.1509/jmkr.48.3.472

White, K., & Peloza, J. (2009). Self-benefit versus other-benefit marketing appeals: Their effectiveness in generating charitable support. Journal of Marketing, 73(4), 109-124. https://doi.org/10.1509/jmkg.73.4.109

White, K., & Simpson, B. (2013). When do (and don't) normative appeals influence sustainable consumer behaviors? Journal of Marketing, 77(2), 78-95. https://doi.org/10.1509/jm.11.0278

In addition, some sentences would strongly benefit from rephrasing and are unclear in their current form, for example: “Consumers with expectations of high product quality and low price, and who expect a low risk, exactly like new products, had a positive evaluation, and were therefore more willing to engage in sustainable purchasing behaviour.” Or “implications that help shape this paper” which could for example be rephrased stating “help guide the development of our theoretical model”.

I wish the authors the best of luck with this research.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This study analyzes the consumer's engagement in sustainable purchasing behavior when they consider remanufactured products purchase. There are several issues to be considered before publication.

In the introduction section, the authors need to explain the middle class concept more precisely. Moreover, this study introduces remanufactured product issues for research motivations, but they need to address the relationship between purchasing remanufactured products and sustainable consumption in detail.

This study considers circular economy; however, this paper should add this concept.

Figure 1 and Figure 2 names need to be fixed. It should be a concise name, and if the authors want to explain it, please make a note below the figure. 

Methodology

I cannot find the data collection date and year.

Most important: you did an online survey, but you didn't report common method variance to check data validation.

Cronbach's alfa should be Cronbach's alpha.

Theoretical implications should include what key findings are compared to the previous studies. The recent version shows your findings of the study are consistent with previous studies only.

For more clarification, the authors need to do minor proof read.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The updated version of the paper has addressed by comments and I consider that the paper can be published.