Influential factors in the consumption of organic products: The case of Ecuadorian and Peruvian millennials

Abstract

This paper identifies the intrinsic and extrinsic fac-tors that influence consumers to purchase organic products, and also determines the barriers that sometimes prevent university student millennials from purchasing this type of product. The research had a qualitative approach and the information was collected through semi-structured interviews, thir-ty-two university student millennials from Ecua-dor and Peru participated in the study and the data was coded using the Grounded Theory. The find-ings determined that intrinsic factors (environmen-tal knowledge, environmental awareness, habits, health and values) and extrinsic factors (family influ-ence, social influence, fear of COVID-19 infection), are the main factors that motivate the consumption of organic products. The study also determined that factors such as availability, price, and skepticism are occasional barriers to the purchase of this type of product. Regarding the originality value, the main contributions of this study are to be one of the first studies in Ecuador and Peru using the Grounded Theory to determine the conceptualisation that millennials have about organic products, as well as learning the influential factors and the existing barriers in the purchase behaviour of organic products in Ecuador and Peru.