How does sustainability initiatives enhance the brand equity of firms

Abstract

Due to the increasing involvement of corporate firms in the field of environmental protection over the past few years, several authors in their work have investigated the precursors and consequences of corporate environmental protection. Existing research investigating the impact of corporate environmental awareness primarily measured the impact on the firms performance. Despite this, no studies have yet been found where the author investigated whether the most important environmental protection initiatives a firm can perform at a corporate level will eventually have any effect on the brand equity or brand value of a firm. Given the above, this study proposes several environmental initiatives a firm can perform in order to demonstrate if these initiatives will have any positive impact on the firms brand value and fill the hole in the literature regarding this topics. Out of the initiatives we highlight three, emission reduction, environmental innovation, and optimization of the use of natural resources. After concluding this research, the results demonstrated that a firm that performs environmental initiatives like emission reduction, environmental innovation, and reduction in the use of natural resources at a corporate level will definitely have a positive and improved brand value.