Disadvantages of the food beauty premium: new marketing communication for organic food Open Access

Global companies focus on developing ethical products in the face of increasingly serious environmental issues (Chatterjee et al., 2021). Food is a leading industry that focuses on sustainability (Bangsa and Schlegelmilch, 2020) and many companies focus on organic food (Watanabe et al., 2020). Consumers understand environmental concerns and demonstrate an attitude that considers the ethical validity of their purchasing behavior (Yoon and Park, 2021); 43% of global consumers choose products based on their sustainable or environmentally friendly qualities (Global Data, 2021). However, increased environmental concerns have not been accompanied by economic growth in the green markets (Testa et al., 2021). Although the world’s organic agricultural land has been growing annually, the proportion of organic land remained at only 2% in 2022 (Willer et al., 2024). The number of ethically labeled foods on supermarket shelves is increasing, but they generally account for less than 10% of total food sales (Iweala et al., 2019).

Ethical consumption is not as widespread as expected because of a gap between consumers’ attitudes toward ethical products in survey settings and their actual purchase behaviors (Eckhardt et al., 2010; Schäufele and Hamm, 2018; Yadav et al., 2024; Zollo, 2024). Although consumers profess that they avoid unethical products, they act on the desire to get the most value for their money (Eckhardt et al., 2010). Therefore, unlike other purchasing behaviors, those based on consumer attitudes are difficult to predict using surveys about ethical consumption (Park and Lin, 2020). This gap between attitudes and behaviors is common in China (Jin et al., 2020), Germany (Wiederhold and Martinez, 2018), Japan (Govind et al., 2019), Thailand (Jusuf and Nuttavuthisit, 2023), the UK (Yamoah and Acquaye, 2019) and the USA (Diddi et al., 2019). The simplest reason for this gap is that in research settings, social desirability bias elicits positive attitudes (Yamoah and Acquaye, 2019); whereas in real settings, the ambiguity of direct benefits impacts behavior (Besharat et al., 2024; Farjam et al., 2019; Tölkes, 2020). This gap may also be explained from a neutralization theory perspective: neutralization techniques allow people to neutralize their feelings of guilt related to the discrepancy between their awareness and their behavior regarding ethical consumption (Chatzidakis et al., 2007; Hassan et al., 2022; Neumann and Mehlkop, 2023; Vitell, 2003).

This study addresses this attitude–behavior gap in the context of purchasing decisions about organic foods. The following two points are the main requirements: first, randomized controlled trials (RCTs) should be used to verify causal effects. RCTs ensure unbiased estimates of treatment effects by matching all conditions across groups with the exception of the treatment condition of interest (Kahan et al., 2014; Pynegar et al., 2021). This method provides the most scientifically robust results (Frederiks et al., 2016). The risk of social desirability bias can be eliminated by blinding RCT participants to the treatment content and by not having strong incentives or expectations for their treatment (Steeger et al., 2021). Although RCTs are the gold standard for estimating the causal effects of treatments, they are often not implemented owing to issues like high costs (Campbell and Labrecque, 2024; Rubin, 2007).

Second, new marketing communications that promote the purchase of organic foods should be considered. A meta-analysis of the past 25 years of research indicated that health and the environment are repeatedly reported as the two main factors promoting the purchase of organic food (Rana and Paul, 2020). Consequently, many researchers believe that conveying health and environmental information about organic foods to consumers can strengthen their product purchase intentions (Aitken et al., 2020; Liang and Lim, 2020; Nagaraj, 2021). Although this knowledge is widespread among researchers, practitioners and consumers (Gundala and Singh, 2021), sales of organic food remain limited. Therefore, there is a serious need for marketing communications that promote a new perspective.

Consequently, we examined marketing communications that may increase purchase intention for organic fruits and vegetables in Japan and verify their causal effect using an RCT. We examined marketing communications focusing on consumers’ values and the negative effects of beauty premiums rather than organic products’ health and environmental benefits. Consumers assign a beauty premium to stereotypically attractive people and things and, conversely, impose an ugly penalty and devalue unattractive people and things (Li et al., 2022; Mookerjee et al., 2021; Peng et al., 2020). Japanese individuals impose a strong beauty premium, especially concerning fruits and vegetables; thus, pesticide cultivation is prioritized over organic cultivation (Nohara, 2024). We sought to clarify the effectiveness of marketing communication aimed at correcting these values. The theoretical contribution of this study is the use of an RCT, which is less susceptible to social desirability bias and introduces a new perspective on beauty premiums to eliminate the attitude–behavior gap in organic foods. Orienting consumers toward eco-friendly and organic products is an international social challenge connected to serious environmental problems (Lavuri et al., 2022). These results have key implications for policymakers and practitioners worldwide.

Although all consumer activities have an essential ethical component, consumers’ behaviors often contradict their stated ethical concerns; thus, they must resolve the contradictions within themselves (Chatzidakis et al., 2004). The mechanism behind this is explained by neutralization theory. Originally, neutralization theory was proposed as a justification or neutralization technique used by delinquent youth to protect themselves from self-blame or others’ criticism (Matza and Sykes, 1957). Subsequently, the theory has been applied to consumer behaviors like shoplifting (Cromwell and Thurman, 2003), copyright infringement (Harris and Dumas, 2009) and counterfeit goods consumption (Bian et al., 2016).

The theory has been extended to explain both blatant violations of social ethics and minor violations of personal moral beliefs (e.g. reluctance to purchase fair trade products; Chatzidakis et al., 2007). Even ethical consumers can easily justify unethical behavior by using neutralization techniques (Vitell, 2003). For those who have learned neutralization techniques, neither environmental concerns nor normative expectations play a role as purchasing decision factors, creating a dissociation between attitudes and behaviors (Neumann and Mehlkop, 2023). Thus, in the current literature on consumer ethics, neutralization theory has become a central marketing theoretical lens (Hassan et al., 2022).

The literature on organic food has repeatedly asserted health and the environment as primary purchase intention factors (Aitken et al., 2020; Eberle et al., 2022; Eyinade et al., 2021; Liang and Lim, 2020; Rana and Paul, 2020).

Health awareness: Organic fruits and vegetables are less likely to contain pesticide residues and are higher in nutrients, such as vitamin C, than conventional fruits and vegetables (Das et al., 2020; Nithya et al., 2022). Consumers are primarily interested in organic food for health (Lin et al., 2021; Rana and Paul, 2020). Egoistic motives for health are a better predictor of organic food purchases than altruistic motives for the environment (Magnusson et al., 2003). Thus, it is effective to promote the sales of organic foods by targeting consumers who are highly concerned about food safety (Iqbal et al., 2021) and communicating their health benefits (Nagaraj, 2021).

Environmental awareness: The growing demand for eco-friendly products is undoubtedly driven by growing environmental concerns among consumers (Leblebici Kocer et al., 2023). Based on societal demands for environmental considerations, consumers are undertaking efforts to make responsible purchases (De Canio et al., 2021; Kumar et al., 2021). In the food industry, organic produce is a typical example of an environmentally friendly product. By eliminating chemical fertilizers and pesticides, organic farming minimizes environmental and ecological impacts and allows fruits and vegetables to be grown while maintaining soil health (Das et al., 2020; Gamage et al., 2023). This environmental concern positively influences consumers’ willingness to purchase organic foods (Rashid and Lone, 2023). This consumer behavior is especially evident among younger generations (Ahmed et al., 2021; Yeo et al., 2022). Therefore, business practitioners are encouraged to use marketing techniques like eco-labeling to promote their products as environmentally friendly to consumers (Al Falah et al., 2024; Kamboj et al., 2023).

However, these factors have not eliminated the attitude–behavior gap and green marketers lack guidance on effective marketing communications to encourage consumers to purchase organic foods (Jäger and Weber, 2020). As environmental awareness falls under altruistic motives, it is likely to be subject to social desirability bias (Yamoah and Acquaye, 2019). Regarding health awareness, it can be inferred that there is little need for organic food because consumers are satisfied with regular vegetables owing to the beauty premium explained in the next section. Expressly, there are concerns that conventional marketing communications focused on the characteristics of organic products cannot convey value to consumers.

The existence of consumer values like beauty premium and ugliness penalty is such a definite consumer behavior that there is no room for debate (Kanazawa and Still, 2018). Ugliness (unattractiveness) in agricultural products refers to agricultural products that differ in shape or color from the original agricultural product even though there are no differences in safety, taste or nutrition (De Hooge et al., 2017). Consumers perceive products as “what is beautiful is good” (Hoegg et al., 2010). The “good” has two main meanings, the first being taste. We expect fruits and vegetables with atypical colors or shapes to taste worse, though their actual tastes are equivalent (De Hooge et al., 2017; Schifferstein et al., 2019). The second meaning is health. People tend to judge beautiful versions as healthier (Haasova and Florack, 2019; Hagen, 2021).

Farmers and business practitioners make difficult decisions in response to consumer values. First, a considerable portion of agricultural produce harvested worldwide is wasted because it does not meet consumers’ expectations, creating the social problem of food loss (Hezarkhani et al., 2023; Spielmann et al., 2024; Wang et al., 2023; Yang et al., 2023). To repel pests from crops and make them more aesthetically pleasing, they abandon organic cultivation and introduce pesticides and chemical fertilizers (Dhakal et al., 2014; Nohara, 2024). The Japanese place great importance on the appearance of fruits and vegetables in terms of their color, shape and size (Ashkenazi and Jacob, 2003). Consequently, Japanese supermarkets sell vegetables treated with legally permissible amounts of pesticides and chemical fertilizers and pesticide-free vegetables are not broadly available (Nohara, 2024). This excessive focus on aesthetics impacts both the health and environmental benefits of organic food and increases prices and economic losses due to food waste (Grewal et al., 2019).

Consequently, consumers abandon essential health in favor of beauty premiums, pushing up product prices and contributing to environmental degradation. When promoting ethical products, it is necessary to demonstrate both ethical aspects and consumer value (Kato et al., 2023). Focusing on the possibility that conveying the above points to consumers will positively change their attitude toward organic foods, we derived the following hypothesis:

Age: In general, younger consumers, such as Millennials (Johnson and Chattaraman, 2019) and Generation Z (Robichaud and Yu, 2022), are more positive about ethical consumption. Therefore, we propose the following hypothesis:

Gender: In general, female consumers tend to consume more environmentally friendly agricultural products than men (Li et al., 2020). Therefore, we propose the following hypothesis:

Income: Another consumer attribute that influences organic food purchase intention is annual income. The higher a consumer’s income, the more likely they are to purchase green food (Hansmann et al., 2020; Li et al., 2020) because organic foods, which have limited distribution, tend to be expensive – a factor that reduces consumers’ purchasing intentions (Diddi et al., 2019; Wiederhold and Martinez, 2018):

Price consciousness: Consideration of price consciousness, defined as the tendency of consumers to focus on paying a lower price (Alford and Biswas, 2002), should be considered. Lower price consciousness is associated with a greater likelihood of purchasing organic products (Parashar et al., 2023). Therefore, we propose the following hypothesis:

Frequency of cooking: Based on construal level theory, when people feel psychologically distant from an object, their interpretation level increases and they perceive the object as essential. Conversely, construal levels are lower when someone feels psychologically close to an object; they also perceive the object more concretely (Trope and Liberman, 2000). Psychological distance also includes experiential distance (Liberman et al., 2007). For example, people feel closer to people they see frequently (Stephan et al., 2011). Moreover, increased contact frequency with a product leads to greater psychological closeness (Hamilton and Thompson, 2007; Li and Sung, 2021): The more experience one has with a product, the closer the psychological distance and the lower the interpretation level.

Considering that the environment and appeal to real health rather than apparent health fall under essential elements, we derived the following hypothesis:

An RCT was conducted in an online survey environment from January 15–22, 2024, targeting 1,500 Japanese adults aged 20–70 years. The survey title was “Survey on Food” and participants were not aware that it was a study of organic products. The survey was distributed to a research panel from Cross Marketing, Inc. – one of Japan’s largest research companies. A total of 5.41 million active participants (those who have participated in a survey within the past 12 months) are registered with this panel (Cross Marketing, 2022). Data were collected equally across sex and age groups to avoid bias toward specific consumer attributes. Regarding composition, participants aged 20–29, 30–39, 40–49, 50–59 and 60–69 years comprised 21.9%, 20.3%, 19.7%, 23.1% and 15.0% of the sample, respectively (51.9% men and 48.1% women). All participants provided informed consent in written form.

The RCT comprised five groups to which the 1,500 participants were randomly assigned (300 per group). As shown in Table 1, Group 1 was the conventional food group and Groups 2–5 were organic foods. Regarding marketing communication, Groups 1–2 received no marketing, Group 3 received health marketing, Group 4 marketing on the environment and Group 5 the disadvantage of the beauty premium. In addition, we tested both fruits and vegetables to generalize our conclusions. In each group, lemons and tomatoes were randomly assigned. The homogeneity of each group affects the validity of an RCT. Table 2 lists each group’s attribute composition. Comparisons of the groups based on age, sex, annual household income and cooking frequency revealed that they were generally homogeneous. For example, a chi-square test on a sex (male/female) × group matrix yields a nonsignificant p-value of 0.688. Similarly, a chi-square test on an age (20s/30s/40s/50s/60) × group matrix also yields a nonsignificant p-value of 0.888. This indicates that the groups have a homogenous distribution of attributes, controlling for the effects of these variables. Table 3 compares the Japanese demographics and the study sample. For each sex and age group, the discrepancy between the actual population and the study sample was within approximately 3%, confirming good market representation.

As shown in Table 4, there were six survey questions. Considering that the reliability of a survey decreases as the number of questions increases (Deutskens et al., 2004; Galesic and Bosnjak, 2009), we used the minimum number of items required for hypothesis testing. We did not include any mention of organic food, as it is important to blind RCT participants to the treatment content to eliminate the risk of social desirability bias (Steeger et al., 2021). After listening to the attribute items for Questions 1–5, the following explanation was provided:

Each participant was presented with a 20-s video and marketing communication according to the conditions of their assigned group. The video conveys the appeal of lemons and tomatoes (Figure 1). The video was prepared to blind the patient to the details of the procedure. If detailed information about organic compounds is provided immediately, it becomes easy to overreact. Rigorous RCT requires a study design that ensures participants do not understand the treatment. Although the image was the same as that in the last scene of the video, the presence or absence of organic text changed depending on the group (Figure 2). Subsequently, participants in Groups 3–5 were presented with their group’s corresponding marketing communications (Figure 3). The contents of Groups 3 and 4 were generated based on the existing literature (Das et al., 2020; Gamage et al., 2023; Nithya et al., 2022). The content of Group 5 is based on H1. The information presented to each group is shown in Figure 4.

The movies were controlled so that the survey screen could not be transitioned unless the participant had watched each in its entirety. Nevertheless, the probability exists that a small proportion of viewers did not give the videos their full attention. However, in an RCT, all conditions other than the treatment are the same for each group; thus, the probability is the same for each group, and the results obtained eliminate the influence of nonserious responses. In Groups 3–5, after watching the video, a marketing communication was presented on the next screen, so the survey screen could not be transitioned unless the participant saw the stimulus. This process enabled us to properly evaluate the causal effects of the harmful effects of the beauty premium.

Participants indicated their purchase intention regarding the agricultural products they viewed on a five-point Likert scale (1 = I do not want to purchase at all to 5 = I want to purchase very much). For verification, a chi-squared test was applied to the group × purchase intention matrix. The null hypothesis was that there is no difference in the distribution of purchase intentions between the groups. Significance was set at 5%. If a significant difference was detected, Steel’s multiple comparison test was used to identify the location of the difference. Group 1 was the control group. The R statistical analysis software was used for the analysis.

Regarding purchase intention, Group 2 had the lowest score and Group 5 – which conveyed the harm of beauty premiums – had the highest score (Table 5). Owing to the chi-square test (p < 0.001), the null hypothesis was rejected. In Steel’s multiple comparison test, only Group 5 was significantly different from the control group (Group 1; p = 0.040; Figure 5). Accordingly, H1 is supported.

First, no difference in appeal was found between regular and organic agricultural products (in fact, organic products were considered less attractive), highlighting the strictness with which consumers judge the value of organic foods. Furthermore, the promotion of organic food from health and environmental perspectives does not make those products more attractive from the consumer’s perspective, which may explain why many companies do not see results even when implementing such marketing communications. Consequently, this research has revealed why new marketing communications strategies are needed to popularize organic food.

Next, Steel’s multiple comparison test was then applied to each attribute. We used the age 40 years, which is approximately in the middle of the target age range of 20–70 years, as the standard (Table 6). Although no significant difference was detected for those aged $≥$40 years (p = 1.000), a significant difference was detected for those aged <40 years (p < 0.001). Thus, Group 5’s marketing communication works for young people and H2-1 is supported. Regarding sex, although no significant difference was detected in women (p = 0.787), a significant difference was detected in men (p = 0.026). This result was the opposite of H2-2 and was not supported. From the perspective of annual income, we used 4 million yen as the standard, as the average annual income of Japanese people is 4.58 million yen (approximately US$29,589; Baggett, 2024). Although no significant difference was detected for less than 4 million yen (p = 0.914), a significant difference was detected for more than 4 million yen (p = 0.026). Consequently, H2-3 is supported. We adapted the questions from Ferreira and Coelho (2015) and defined respondents’ price consciousness as “high” if they scored 4–5 on a five-point Likert scale and “low” for scores of 1–3 (Table 3). Although no significant difference was detected when price consciousness was high (p = 0.661), a significant difference was detected when price consciousness was low (p = 0.026), thus supporting H2-4. Finally, from the perspective of cooking frequency, cooking two or more times a week was defined as high frequency, and cooking less than once a week was defined as low frequency. Although no significant difference was detected at high frequencies (p = 0.670), a significant difference was detected at low frequencies (p = 0.026), thus supporting H2-5.

The existing literature on organic food has repeatedly advocated the two purchasing factors of health and the environment (Aitken et al., 2020; Eberle et al., 2022; Eyinade et al., 2021; Liang and Lim, 2020; Rana and Paul, 2020). However, RCT results revealed that these factors did not work well. As environmental awareness has altruistic motives, traditional survey methods are likely to be influenced by social desirability bias. Health awareness is an egoistic motive related to consumer value. However, ordinary fruits and vegetables have a beauty premium, giving the impression that “pretty/beautiful = healthy” (Hagen, 2021). Consequently, we infer that consumers are satisfied with ordinary agricultural products. Under strict RCT conditions, these factors do not affect consumers’ purchase intentions.

As expected, we confirmed that marketing communication conveying the negative effects of the beauty premium and departure from its value system increased consumers’ intention to purchase organic food. As for the hypotheses, only H2-2, the difference in effects due to sex, was not supported. In general, women tend to consume more environmentally friendly agricultural products than men (Li et al., 2020); thus, we expected that the hypothesized effect would be more pronounced for women. However, the new marketing communication method proposed in this study is more logical than emotional communication. When making decisions, women tend to emphasize emotion and empathy, whereas men tend to emphasize logic and rationality (Fumagalli et al., 2010); thus, we inferred that men more easily accepted the content of the hypothesis.

The findings have several theoretical implications. The first is the elimination of the attitude–behavior gap in ethical consumption. Although this is an important academic and practical topic (Caruana et al., 2016; Nguyen et al., 2019), it remains unresolved (ElHaffar et al., 2020; Gruber and Schlegelmilch, 2014; Sun, 2020). Thus, this study adopted an RCT (Campbell and Labrecque, 2024; Frederiks et al., 2016; Kahan et al., 2014; Pynegar et al., 2021), which can verify causal effects with the highest degree of confidence. In the RCT procedure, participants were blinded to the treatment to eliminate the risk of social desirability bias (Steeger et al., 2021). It is important to conduct the survey without disclosing the purpose by eliminating questions about ethical awareness and minimizing the number of questions to improve the quality of the responses.

The contribution of this study is that it revealed that the adoption of this rigorous process resolved the unresolved paradox of the gap between attitudes and behavior regarding ethical consumption. The results confirmed that even in a survey environment, consumers do not have a positive attitude toward organic products that claim to be healthy and environmentally friendly. If there is no difference in purchasing intentions between conventional and organic agricultural products, people naturally purchase conventional agricultural products because they are cheaper.

Unlike the existing literature on health awareness (Iqbal et al., 2021; Nagaraj, 2021; Rana and Paul, 2020) and environmental awareness (Ahmed et al., 2021; Rashid and Lone, 2023; Yeo et al., 2022), our results indicate that people do not value organic food, as illustrated by their actual purchasing behavior, without falling into social desirability bias. In contrast to existing studies that have been plagued by consumers’ pretense in the survey environment, this study’s approach means that consumers’ true feelings are extracted. Accordingly, for products susceptible to social desirability bias, such as ethical products (Yamoah and Acquaye, 2019), it is important to derive evidence from RCTs that follow the above procedures.

Second, we propose a new marketing strategy to promote the purchase of organic products. As environmental problems become more severe, developing measures to direct consumers toward environmentally friendly organic products is an international social challenge (Lavuri et al., 2022). Until now, scientists and practitioners have mainly focused on two product attributes: health and the environment (Aitken et al., 2020; Eberle et al., 2022; Eyinade et al., 2021; Liang and Lim, 2020; Rana and Paul, 2020); however, this study focused on the consumer values of “beauty premium” and “ugly penalty”. By clinging to excessive beauty premiums, consumers prioritize apparent health (Hagen, 2021), resulting in considerable food and economic losses (Hezarkhani et al., 2023; Spielmann et al., 2024; Yang et al., 2023). Organic products provide health and environmental benefits. The intention to purchase organic products can be promoted by communicating the harmful effects of this excessive value system and ways to escape it.

Similarly, previous research has demonstrated that intentionally adding an “ugly” label to unattractive agricultural products increases the likelihood of purchase (Mookerjee et al., 2021). This study is novel in that it shifts the focus from distorted agricultural products to consumers with biased values. Combating food loss and environmental issues requires new marketing concepts to increase the utility of discarded ingredients (Aschemann-Witzel et al., 2023). The current results provide important suggestions for developing organic industries within the international community.

This study offers several valuable and practical suggestions. First, marketers of organic products should consider appeals beyond health and environmental considerations. A lack of product knowledge is a problem in promoting the purchase of organic foods (Eberle et al., 2022; Nithya et al., 2022). The health and environmental benefits of organic products have been communicated for years. Consequently, many consumers perceive organic foods as more nutritious, natural and environmentally friendly than conventional foods (Gundala and Singh, 2021).

However, the appeal to date has been ineffective in changing purchasing behavior. Therefore, business managers should shift from relying on past unsuccessful health and environmental features to new marketing communications. A shift in strategy that focuses on changing consumer values rather than promoting products may be more effective. A lack of product knowledge is a problem in promoting the purchase of organic foods (Eberle et al., 2022; Nithya et al., 2022). Raising awareness among consumers about organic food is an important task for practitioners.

Second, in addition to communicating the characteristics of the organic products themselves, another effective means is to communicate distortions in consumer values. By applying beauty premiums to agricultural products, consumers perceive products that have the appearance of being controlled by pesticides to be deceptively delicious and nutritious. To respond to this unconscious need, farmers are abandoning organic cultivation and introducing pesticides and chemical fertilizers (Dhakal et al., 2014; Nohara, 2024). Moreover, enormous food losses can cause economic losses and price increases (Grewal et al., 2019; Hezarkhani et al., 2023; Spielmann et al., 2024; Wang et al., 2023; Yang et al., 2023). This reality should be communicated to consumers, as poor product knowledge is a problem in promoting the purchase of sustainable products (Eberle et al., 2022; Nithya et al., 2022; Ronda, 2024), and this knowledge is not yet widespread. As shown in this study, when this knowledge is communicated, consumers change their attitude toward organic products positively. Marketers may be afraid to convey this knowledge to consumers. However, in this study, consumers accepted this information and thoroughly considered organic products. This new marketing communication is innovative and distinctly different from the conventional approach of labeling such products as “environmentally friendly”. Rather than simply conveying the single words “environment” or “health”, practitioners should continue to carefully communicate the distorted values of the consumers themselves, resulting in a situation in which consumers are abandoning product value (health aspects) and continuing to accelerate worsening social problems (environmental aspects). This key change is necessary to address the challenging market issues that organic produce currently faces. At first glance, business managers may find it difficult to judge the effectiveness of this proposal. Therefore, they should base their judgment on reliable evidence, such as RCTs.

Third, when promoting ethical products, marketing should not be limited to individuals with a high ethical awareness. Existing literature has repeatedly argued that consumers’ high social and environmental awareness is the most important factor for ethical consumption (Testa et al., 2021). However, if these individuals were the majority in the market, organic foods would account for a large proportion of the market. As the market for organic food is small, most people free from social desirability bias have little interest in ethical consumption. Consequently, to popularize common products, such as fruits and vegetables, we should not limit our efforts to a minority of people who are highly ethically conscious. Consequently, business managers need to be wary of biased consumer survey results. Consumer survey data on ethical consumption may be skewed by a high proportion of highly ethical respondents. Data that shows market representativeness, such as that in this study, should be used as a basis for making decisions.

Fourth, government and administrative policymakers who want to promote green food should formulate policies that prioritize developing consumer demand. In contrast, many practitioners and researchers promote increasing production by supporting farmers through subsidies for organic farming (Amankwah‐Amoah, 2024; Desai et al., 2024; Luo et al., 2024; Yang et al., 2024). However, even if prices drop slightly, the effect of subsidies is limited if consumers perceive the product to be of low value. For instance, low-cost vegetables and fruits that are managed with pesticides look more delicious owing to beauty premiums. Consequently, even organic vegetables and fruits that are priced at the same level through subsidies run the risk of being less attractive. Ample literature shows that government subsidies to green businesses are ineffective (Li, 2014; Thao and Xie, 2024; Xie et al., 2015). Thus, it is difficult to expand green business through armchair calculations that ignore consumer psychology. Instead, any expansion in the green food market will be driven by consumer demand. As shown in this study, consumer perception must be analyzed; the causes of the target product’s declining appeal, identified; and policies to resolve them, developed. Government policies to achieve this include better marketing communications and less reliance on using subsidies to promote the spread of high-cost products. To continue creating meaningful products, efforts must focus on increasing consumer purchase intent and willingness to pay. Regardless of a product’s social significance, if consumers do not perceive it as valuable, the business will fail. Governments and business managers must be aware of this and move away from relying on easy subsidies and discounts.

We introduced a marketing perspective in which the negative effects of beauty premiums were shared to promote the purchase of organic agricultural products. By clinging to these excessive values, consumers abandon essential health in favor of apparent health, increase product prices and contribute to environmental degradation. The results of an RCT revealed that the above marketing communication significantly increased purchase intention. Appeals to health and the environment, which have been emphasized to date, had no effect on purchase intention when the social desirability bias was removed.

Despite its valuable implications, this study has some limitations. First, this study included a limited number of demographic variables. When random allocation is possible, it is desirable to conduct an RCT, as it provides the most reliable scientific evidence (Torgerson and Torgerson, 2008). To demonstrate the validity of the RCT adopted in this study, we showed that the distributions of age, sex, annual household income and frequency of cooking for each group were homogeneous. To ensure increased validity, it would be effective to include demographic variables like shopping frequency and number of family members.

Second, the generalizability of the conclusions is limited because the results are limited to Japan. Currently, 47.8% of organic food sales are in the USA, 39.4% in Europe and 11.2% in Asia (of which 82.7% is in China; Willer et al., 2024). Organic food sales have not spread sufficiently to other regions (Dorce et al., 2021) and Japan is an underdeveloped country in terms of organic food (Nohara, 2024). In addition, Japanese people tend to place a strong emphasis on the aesthetic beauty of fruits and vegetables (Ashkenazi and Jacob, 2003). Thus, further verification is required to determine whether the current results would work similarly in the USA and Europe, where organic foods are relatively widespread.

Third, it has not been verified whether the marketing communication proposed in this study leads to actual purchase behavior. The attitude–behavior gap resolved in this study is limited to the appeal of organic foods from both conventional health and environmental aspects. We showed that these appeals were not affected by social desirability bias and were ineffective in a survey environment. In the future, we need to conduct RCTs at sales sites, such as supermarkets, and verify whether the proposed new marketing communication impacts behavior. Organic foods’ higher prices will be an important point to consider.

Fourth, this study did not clarify the difference between the reactions of highly ethically conscious consumers who continue to purchase organic food and those of most other consumers. This study’s RCT did not include questions regarding environmental and health concerns to avoid raising awareness of organic foods before presenting the treatment. Therefore, to determine the differences in the reactions of people who are and are not highly ethically conscious, it is necessary to divide the survey into two parts and use a preliminary survey to ascertain the ethical consciousness of participants.

Fifth, like ethical attitudes, the moderating effect of health attitudes has not been well examined. Because organic agricultural products have healthy characteristics (Das et al., 2020; Lin et al., 2021; Nithya et al., 2022; Rana and Paul, 2020), the moderating effect of values related to health attitudes should also be examined. Fifth, the effect of communicating the harmful effects of beauty premiums has not been compared with the effect of price reductions. Currently, the easiest way to sell ugly produce is to reduce the price. If the effect proposed in this study is superior to price reductions, it will have a much greater significance for companies and farmers. These are topics for future research.

This work was supported by Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI (Grant Number 23K12567).