Meet Today’s Sustainability Consumer Segments

Most people agree the environment and climate change are a concern, but people's attitudes towards the issue and the actions they take can be very different. In early 2021, Ipsos developed a global 'sustainability segmentation' to better understand how different types of consumers might take different approaches to environmental sustainability. We cover 15 markets with this global segmentation and have been collecting data quarterly as part of the Ipsos Essentials tracking study to understand how the segments are evolving over time. For example, consider the impact of the pandemic (and post-pandemic), inflation, and global conflict on people’s sustainability priorities – how important does protecting the planet become when we are simultaneously trying to protect ourselves and our financial wellbeing?

In this session from our ESG series, Ipsos’ Naumi Haque, SVP and lead for the Ipsos Essentials program, introduces the different segments of consumers and share how best to appeal to them with sustainable offers. As interest in ESG priorities continues to grow, we have also explored how to expand our understanding of the segments beyond the Environment to also capture Social issues and corporate Governance. Using the most recent, November 2023 iteration of the data, Naumi highlights early findings from this more expansive investigation of consumer behaviours and attitudes.