Green Purchasing by Wine Retailers: Roles of Individual Values, Competences and Organizational Culture

The wine industry impacts the environment due to its massive scale of production, distribution, and retail. Wine retailers’ green purchasing is essential for changing environmental initiatives because purchasing is a key function for managing an upstream supply chain and to further achieve sustainability throughout the entire supply chain. Thus, this study was designed to identify important drivers of wine retailers’ green purchasing by incorporating both individual factors (values and competences) and organizational culture. Hierarchical linear modeling was employed to analyze the nested data obtained from 457 purchasing managers working for 10 wine retail companies in the United States. Results documented that individual values (social desire and moral attitudes), cognitive competence, and organizational culture such as the ethical behavior of top management, positively and directly influenced wine retailers’ green purchasing behavior. In addition, the study findings revealed that the effects of individual values and cognitive competence on wine retailers’ green purchasing behavior were positively enhanced when organizational culture was formed based on top management’s ethical behavior, codes of conduct and incentives. Implications for developing effective methods for improving wine retailers’ green purchasing behavior are presented and discussed.