Changing audience behaviour: Festival goers and throwaway tents

Purpose: To translate theory into a practical tool, the purpose of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework for the development of social marketing strategies to modify event attendee behaviour in a sustainable direction.

Design/methodology/approach: Consumer value is synthesised with social marketing and consumer behaviour theory to develop the framework. A major problem for festivals (throwaway tents) and current pro-environmental practices are used to determine the framework's applicability.

Findings: The conceptual framework suggests that achieving desired behaviour(s) within an audience requires consideration of the added value at the downstream level, strategies that recognise offsite/onsite behaviour settings, engagement of upstream advocacy and more attention to the evaluation of success.

Research limitations/implications: A single low-involvement behaviour example is used to validate the conceptual framework suggesting further work is needed to widen tests of its applicability.

Originality/value: This paper synthesises theory into a framework that has significant potential as a tool to develop behavioural change strategies at events.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/IJEFM-11-2013-0031