Making Information on CSR Scores Salient: A Randomized Field Experiment

We locate a giant ‘school report-like’ scorecard poster with domain-specific social and environmental responsibility scores of the ten leading world food companies, measured by the Oxfam ‘Behind the Brands’ world campaign, at the entrance of selected supermarkets. We test the impact of these scores on consumers’ choices by means of a randomized field experiment. Our findings show that the Oxfam ranking matters since the treatment has a positive and significant effect on the market share of the companies with the highest scores and a negative and significant effect on the companies placed at the lowest ranks. Invisibility matters too, with the largest non-ranked companies selling in the store experiencing a slight fall in their market shares.