What really counts

How we lie to ourselves when shopping

When shopping, most customers ultimately decide on the price. We believe that 78% of consumers say that they do not buy because of promotions, but still look for cheap goods.

(Bild: Drobot Dean - stock.adobe.com)

Upper Austrians want food from organic farming and ethically fair production. However, according to a study by the University of Linz, it is not "noble motives" that make the difference in the supermarket, but usually simply the price. And by the way, we rate others "worse" than ourselves.

"Hypocritical" - that's what the authors of the study by the Institute for Trade, Sales and Marketing at the University of Linz call it. In previous surveys, up to 72 percent of Upper Austrians stated that they pay attention to organic food. 85 percent stated that regionality was important to them and when asked about animal welfare, a Chamber of Labor survey even found 92 percent approval.

Self-image is better than external image
But things look different at the checkout, as researchers in Linz have now discovered. They asked Upper Austrians how they assess the actual purchasing behavior of other customers and also how they evaluate their own reasons for making decisions at the shelf. The result: in general, the majority believe that 72 percent of consumers are not guided by values such as organic, sustainability or regionality. However, 47 percent of those surveyed also see this behavior in themselves.

Ethics, organic, regionality and quality have arrived in people's minds, but our actions are lagging behind

Christoph Teller, Vorstand des Instituts für Handel, Absatz und Marketin an der Linzer Uni

Bargains still work
Upper Austrians are particularly self-critical when it comes to the issue of fair production: 51% say that they act differently than stated. 57 percent of Upper Austrians are of the opinion that promotions do not work, but that they still look for bargains. And 51% of Austrians believe that price comes before quality, with 75% saying the same of others.