Consuming nature : Toward Transformational Sustainability in Swedish outdoor brands

Abstract: The accelerated cycle of production and consumption has had tremendous environmental consequences since the 20th century. Corporate interest needed a society of over-consumption, creating the take-make-waste linear systems as we know it. The rise of leisure culture enabled an escape of society through outdoor recreation, while at the same time creating a new leisure industry, contradictive to the purpose of outdoor recreation. Being in nature is in Sweden called friluftsliv which is a cultural notion built in Swedish identities. This value is embedded in sustainability and nature, which is core in Swedish outdoor brands and its consumers, while at the same time being captured within the system of production and consumption. This conflict will be investigated in this thesis by analysing sustainability communication and marketing in how it constructs the brand values and influence consumer culture, based on ethnography and narrative analyses framed as Sustainability Storytelling. An in-depth case study of two brands by semi-structured interviews provides insight on business operations and mindsets for ambitious action toward a sustainable future. A theoretical framework was built to define how outdoor brands can function for a truly sustainable friluftsliv, framed as Transformational Sustainability, by shifts in business operations and in communications to make sustainable consumption possible and desirable. The results indicate a constructed type of friluftsliv based in consumption, through marketing of nature and sustainability, which is contradictive to the inherent values of the sector. While the core values and proved practical changes simultaneously enables a possibility for a shift toward a truly sustainable friluftsliv.