CUSTOMERS' ATTITUDE TOWARDS GREEN PACKAGING: A CASE OF SAPPHIRE, PAKISTAN

Sustainable packaging has become very important nowadays. Technology has changed our life, but nature has a bad effect due to this change. Companies are now focusing on producing green/sustainable products. The motive of this research was to investigate the attitude of customers towards green packaging. This research is conducted within the clothing industry in the context of Sapphire. For this research, we selected three variables to include Environmental Concern, Green Packaging Attitude, and Willingness to Pay More which influence the customers towards purchase intention for green packaging. Questions were adopted from different articles for questionnaire development, data is collected from 167 respondents who the buyers of the clothing industry through an online survey and in person from the branches of Sapphire that include Dolmen Mall Tariq Road & Clifton, lucky one Mall. Data gathered from the respondents is analyzed from SPSS and PLS-SEM both. Findings demonstrated that all independent variables Environmental Concern, Green Packaging Attitude, and Willingness to Pay More are in a strong relationship with the dependent variable Green Purchase Intention. This study is going to benefit business organization for CSR activities for introducing sustainable packaging. Secondly current research is important for Sapphire clothing specially, to know about their customers and introducing more ways to sustain the environment.


INTRODUCTION
1 Student, Benazir School of Business, BBSUK. Email: mkashifj98@gmail.com 2 Student, Benazir School of Business, BBSUK. Email: tayyabarani98@gmail.com [5] of green packaged products shows the willingness to purchase eco-friendly packaged products (Alienation). As the information about green packaging is increasing people are preferring ecofriendly packaged products.

Industry Brief
The textile industry is emerging in the whole World. Environmental sustainability is very important for the textile and apparel industry because this industry plays a significant role in the social and economic development of developing countries. Many brands like Levi's are making themselves eco-friendly through producing green products, It has come with a 'waterless' campaign by introducing denim jeans which absorb less water. Textile is the emerging industry and largest manufacturing sector of Pakistan. It has an 8.5% contribution to the GDP of Pakistan and exports textile products all over Asia. Sapphire is one of the clothes manufacturing brands of Pakistan, exporting its products globally and currently, it is operating more than 20 outlets in different cities of Pakistan. Sapphire has started their 'Go Green' concept by introducing green and environmentally friendly seed-filled shopping bags encouraging the customers to grow plants.

RESEARCH PROBLEM
Environmental concern is a crucial marketing concern nowadays. To sustain the environment and nature all organizations have to work towards benefitting nature by going green through producing eco-friendly products, using sustainable packaging that is not harmful to the environment. Our study is an intention to investigate the attitude of customers towards green packaging whether they are willing to buy products in green packaging, they care for the environment, and if they can pay a price premium for the green packaging to sustain the environment.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS
The research questions for this study are below: 1. What factors impact the purchase intention of the customers towards green packaged products? 2. What is the attitude of customers towards green packaging?
3. What is the impact of environmental concern on the customers to purchase green packaged products? 4. What is the intention of customers towards a willingness to pay more for green packaging?

OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
The objective of this research is to investigate the relationship between green packaging and customer buying behavior in Pakistan. Furthermore, the research is going to discuss the awareness level of customers on green marketing and the factors which influence consumer purchase intention towards green packaged products.

JUSTIFICATION
This study is important for business organizations, especially for the textile and apparel industry in Pakistan, and more specifically for Sapphire Textile to know about their customer's attitude towards green packaging. Many researchers have worked on green packaging in different industries. Research is conducted in India in the apparel industry on green apparel , but we did not come across any study on the clothing industry in this aspect.
As this study will obtain information about the customers of Sapphire a clothing brand, the study will help organizations to ascertain their sustainability practices and determine their cost related to green packaging.

LIMITATIONS
This research paper has several limitations which are the following: These variables were able to explain to a certain extent about the consumer's purchase decision.
The relationship between IVs and DV is deemed positive and significant.
The study takes a small sample size due to time and resource constraints.
In the future, the light should shed on other variables such as green products, green promotion, and green pricing influence on consumer's purchase decision.

RESEARCH SCOPE
• This study will be helpful for clothing brands in how they can work for environmental concerns and come with new ideas to protect the planet; even other industries can take benefits from them.
• Mostly Sapphire Clothing brand will know about its green strategy impact and it can come with other green sources that will help to gain more customers.
Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [7] • This study will help the organizations to make strategies towards green packaging.
• People will be healthy and will be protected from the pollution which is generated through the manufacturing of inorganic packaging.

Environmental Concern
A study was conducted to investigate the impact of environmental concern (altruistic value) on purchase intention in India (Parkash, 2019). This study reveals that people who have information about the environment and have an environmental concern, want to work for the benefit of society highly prefer green packaging. Another research was conducted in India , their purpose was to know the intention of purchasing eco-friendly packaged products among young consumers. The study was quantitative. They took environmental concern as a variable & find out that Indian consumers are more conscious about the environment and they feel responsible for the sake of society.
Similarly,  aimed to know the customers' attitude to pay more for green packaging. This study took place in India. They took a variable named environmental concern and found that consumers who have a concern about the environment are more knowledgeable about green packaging. Environmental concern and willingness to pay more has a positive relationship but it is not found that highly environmental concerned consumers will pay more for green packaging. Another recent study was conducted on the consumers of Morocco (Mkik S. &., 2019). The purpose of the research was to investigate the attitude of consumers towards green packaging, whether it is positive or not. Environmental concern was the study variable and they found out that environmental concern has a highly positive impact on the consumer's attitude towards green packaging.
A study from Iran (Kashi, 2019) conducted to know the behavior of consumers on the purchase intention for environmentally friendly products. They selected some variables that can affect consumer purchase intention. For this study, 450 students from a university took part in the survey with a random sampling method. Results were in support of the variable environmental concern; it is a leading factor for customers towards the purchase of green products. Similarly, a study was conducted in India  with the purpose to know the environmentally friendly purchase intention in the context of green apparel. The data is collected through a structured questionnaire. Results reveal that concern for the environment has the main impact Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [8] on purchase intention for green apparel. Young consumers in India are more conscious about the environment and environmental concern has high impact than health concern as previous researchers found (Parkash, 2019).
A study conducted in India (Chaudhary, 2018) with the purpose to know the determinants affecting and their significance in predicting eco-friendly purchase behavior among young, educated consumers in India. 202 young consumers including 89% males and 11% females with the age of 15 to 30 from an Institute provided data through an online survey. Results concluded that environmental concern has no significant effect on the purchase intentions of millennial, contradicting with the previous studies of (Parkash, 2019) where environmental concern significantly affecting the purchase intention.

Green Packaging Attitude
A research was conducted in India . The purpose of the study was to investigate the intention of young consumers towards purchasing eco-friendly packaged products. This study shows the results that the attitude of consumers has a positive impact on purchase intention of green packaging. Customers are ready to purchase eco-friendly packaged products. Similarly, another study was conducted in India (Parkash, 2019), indicating that values (altruistic & egoistic) and customers' attitude towards green packaging is in a significant relationship. Altruistic values affect more on consumer attitudes towards green packaging, which means people with a concern for the environment are more interested to purchase green packaged products.
A research was conducted in China (X. Xu, 2019) with the purpose to know the intention of consumers to purchase green furniture. From collected data through an online survey, 460 questionnaires were analyzed. Findings demonstrated that the attitude of customers to purchase green furniture is not significantly affecting the purchase intention. Hence, results were against the previous studies that studied in other industries like in apparel industry ) that attitude has a main role in green purchase intention.
Another study in Morocco (Mkik S. &., 2019), conducted to learn the attitude of customers towards green packaging. They chose the different variables affecting the customers' attitude, including demographic factors, product characteristics, environmental concern, and Government role. Results denoted that consumers' attitudes and green packaging are in a strongly positive relationship. Product characteristics matter the most to buy green packaging.
All variables showed a positive relationship, but the environmental concern was the high Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [9] associated variable with consumer attitude. Similarly a research was conducted in Iran (Kashi, 2019), to study the factors that influence consumers to purchase green products over other products. Students from the University of Iran with a quantity of 450 participated in the survey.
Results indicate that green purchase attitude has a significant positive relationship with the purchase intention for green products. Green purchase attitude comes through concern for the environment which leads towards green product purchase.
Another research in the context of the furniture industry was conducted in China (Xua, 2020), to find the determinants affecting the consumer's purchase intention to purchase authentic green furniture. Results suggested that consumer's attitude has not a significant impact on the purchase intention for green furniture related to the previous study (X. Xu, 2019).
A research was conducted in India , to study about the environmentally responsible purchase intention in the context of the apparel industry. They selected a green purchase attitude as the influencing factor towards purchase intention. The results demonstrate that attitude plays a major role in green purchase intention and, for consumers, whose purchase intentions are due to environmental concern, attitude affects more on their decision.

Willingness to Pay More
A research was conducted in India (Mishra J. M., 2017). Its purpose was to investigate the customers' attitude to pay more for the eco-friendly packaging. They selected willingness to pay more as a variable and took other factors that influence to pay more. They found out that customers with environmental concern are willing to pay more for green packaging, but it is not confirmed that high concern for the environment influence to pay more. Customers who believe strongly about positive consequences are willing to pay more than people with less belief about positive consequences. Another research was conducted in India , purpose of this research was to find out the intention of young consumers to purchase eco-friendly packaged products. Willingness to pay more has a significant impact on the purchase intention and it contradicted the previous studies that says price is a barrier to purchase green packaged products. It is also found that Indian consumers are willing to pay more for the benefits of eco-friendly packaging. Similarly a study was conducted in India  to know the impact of green packaging on consumer behavior through measurement of willingness to pay more. Result indicated that all factors influences on buyers' willingness to pay more, factors include epistemic value, functional value, economic value, symbolic value, altruistic value, and biosphere value. Result from this study props and expand Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [10] the findings of (Mishra J. M., 2017). Factor altruistic value influences to pay more for green packaging associates with the suggestion of the previous research . Outcomes infer that consumer who admit being green as a distinguishing value are also ready to accept increased prices.
A study in US (Wei, 2018), conducted in the context of custom designs T-shirts. Purposely they chose the variables include customer participation (CP), lack of environmental concern (LoEC), perceived consumer effectiveness (PCE), eco-literacy (EL) affecting on willingness to pay more (WTPM). The results demonstrate that LoEC and WTPM has a significant inverse relationship that means consumer with more negative attitude towards protecting the environment would less like to pay more for green products. Another study was conducted in India . They did experiment on young consumers of India with the purpose to know how much responsible the consumers are to make environmentally friendly purchase in the clothing industry. They examined the impact of willingness to pay more price on the purchase intention. The results indicate that willing to pay more positively influences the purchase intention towards green apparels. Young consumers are willing to pay more if they have knowhow about the benefits of green products and those people who have a concern about the environment.
A study in India (Chaudhary, 2018) conducted to investigate the influencing factors and their importance in predicting green purchase intention among young/millennial educated consumers of India. Sample was taken among the students from an Institute in India. From findings they came to know that willingness to pay for green packaging positively affects the purchase intention. They are ready to pay extra for green purchase even they have a price sensitive mind. A study conducted in India (T. Ali, 2020), with the purpose to know about the factors affecting the consumers' willingness to pay for health and wellness food products. The selected factors were socio-demographic, psychological factors, market, and product attributes.
Results concluded that socio-demographic factors, education, and income has a significant effect on willingness to pay for purchasing health and wellness food products. Health consciousness is the key psychological factor positively impacting on willingness to pay.
Similarly, quality, packaging, taste, and price from the product attributes factor significantly impacting on the willingness to pay for health and wellness food products. Market attributes factor has a less impact on willingness to pay for health and wellness food products.

Purchase Intention
Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [11] A study conducted in India (Parkash, 2019) to examine the influence of values on the purchase intention. These values include egoistic (health concern) and altruistic (environmental concern). Results indicate that customers with high knowledge and environmental concern highly prefer green packaging. Similarly, another research was conducted in India , their purpose was to find the intention to purchase eco-friendly packaged products of young customers. They selected variety of variables affecting the purchase intention, these include consumer attitude, environmental concern, and personal norms and willingness to pay more. Customers purchase due to variety of reasons, but consumer attitude is the main factor influencing more to purchase.
A research in China (X. Xu, 2019) conducted with the purpose to investigate the purchase intention of Chinese customers to purchase green furniture. Findings explained that all variables were significantly affecting the purchase intention except consumer's attitude towards green packaging. Perceived behavioral control has the most significant impact on the purchase intention. Health consciousness is the second most influencing factor on the green purchase intention. Subjective norms, willingness to pay more and environmental awareness has also a strong and positive impact on green purchase intention.
Another study was conducted in India  with the purpose to know that it matters for consumers to make environmentally purchase or not. They selected some variables include environmental consciousness, attitude, willingness to pay more, social norms to examine the purchase intention in the context of eco-friendly apparels. All factors were positively affecting on the purchase intention for green apparels, young consumers in India are highly involved in protecting the environment through making environmentally purchase. In India young consumers are active in purchase of green packaged products. A research conducted (Chaudhary, 2018) with the purpose to examine the impact of determinants and their worth in predicting the environmentally purchase behavior among young, educated consumers of India.
They studied on the different variables including willingness to pay more, personal norms, perceived value and environmental concern affecting the green purchase intention. Results demonstrated that variables including environmental concern and personal norms failed to effect on the purchase intention of the young consumers but remaining two variables have a positive impact on the purchase intention.
A study in China (Xua, 2020) conducted to investigate the determinants of consumers purchase intention to purchase authentic green furniture. The data was collected through online Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [12] questionnaire survey from the potential customers of a famous furniture company of China.
Results showed that perceived behavioral control has the most strong and positive impact on the purchase intention for green furniture, confirming the findings of previous study (X. Xu, 2019). However, consumer's attitude (X. Xu, 2019), subjective norms and environmental consciousness are not significantly affecting the purchase intention. Remaining variables including experience, and physical health concern has a significant impact on green furniture purchase intention.

Research design
The current research is quantitative and the studies said that it has been done previously by many other researchers in different industries. Researchers made the questionnaire according to the requirements of this research. Online questionnaires are the tool of that research for the collection of data which is mostly based on all the closed-ended questions which show the relationship of independent and dependent variables. This research is based on quantitative data, as we gathered data through an online survey and in-person from the customers purchasing from Sapphire. The customers of sapphire gave us responses by filling our questionnaire. Our questionnaire is on Green Packaging which is the packing of sapphire. In this research quantitative approach has been used and the data is gathered from the customers or sapphire. A questionnaire was developed to gather the data from the respondents/customers of sapphire. We used the Likert scale in the questionnaire. The data is gathered from the authentic source and it was clearly defined to them that their provided information will be used for research purpose only.

Conceptual Framework
The conceptual framework has developed consistent with research questions objectives and hypotheses. The conceptual framework shows a graphical representation of the conceptual model on which this study is based. It outlined the independent variable and dependent variable. The conceptual framework is showing the relationship between dependent and independent variables.

Procedure
We collected our primary data through an online survey questionnaire from the customers of the clothing brand Sapphire. And then we analyzed our data in SPSS and Smart PLS software.

Population
According to the Pakistan Population Review, the population of Karachi is more than 15 million, from which we have selected the customers of a particular brand Sapphire from the clothing industry as a sample and due to limited time, we gathered data from 167 participants through an online and in-person survey.

Sample and Sampling Methods
It is concerned with how much data we have required to make the correct decision on research.
There are millions of customers purchasing clothes, we have selected 200 people through a random sampling method. The total respondents are 167 chose for data analysis and the questionnaire contains 13 questions regarding the customers' attitude towards green packaging.
A self-administered questionnaire was sent via email and through physical distribution at various outlets of Sapphire in Karachi, Pakistan.

Instrument Selection
In this research, a structured questionnaire is used to obtain data and gather information regarding consumers' behavior towards green packaging. The survey questionnaire was adopted from the previous similar studies and that was to make sure that the survey is readable, consistent, clear, and feasible for respondents to answer. The primary data has been collected Green Packaging Attitude (GPA)

Environmental Concern
Willingness to Pay More (WTPM)

Purchase Intention (PI)
Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [14] through an online survey questionnaire from the respondents. The questionnaire was divided into two parts. The first part addressed the demographic information on a nominal scale, whereas the second part of the measure was negotiating with the elements to measure the variables under the study on 5 points Likert scale, from 1 to 5 level 1= Strongly Disagree, 2= Disagree, 3= Neutral, 4= Agree, 5= Strongly Agree, because the Likert scale is continuous and it measures the intensity and insight of the subjective constructs, hence widely used in the field of management science. It is used for measure and is an updated and reliable five-item version of an earlier scale (Keller, 2003). The statistical tools have been used for testing the validity of the variables, it showed how logical the content is, and measure the validity of variables of the data. Statistical tools are also used for testing the reliability of data whereas the consistency of the data is a measure.

H1: Customer's attitude and green packaging purchase intention are in a positive relationship.
H2: Environmental concern and green packaging purchase intention are in a positive relationship.
H3: willingness to pay more and green packaging purchase intention is in a positive relationship.

Plan of Analysis
The data analysis is done based on applying regression analysis. Smart PLS software has been used to analyze the data and to perform inferential statistics.

Research Schedule
This research is completed in two months duration in the first month the data is collected by doing different tasks and reserved for analysis. And in the second month, we applied different statistical tools to interpretations of collecting data.

DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS
This research aims to investigate the consumer attitude towards green packaging in the context of clothing industry. This study is applied as providing the solution for the current problem.
This is an exploratory type of research, data is gathered through distribution of structured questionnaire via social media and emails. Questionnaire is adopted from the previous Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [15] researches, reliability and validity test is conducted. Data is analyzed through the SPSS and PLS-SEM.
Respondents Profile:

Reliability
Reliability shows the internal consistency of the instrument. It evaluates that if an instrument or questionnaire is used to measure something number of times it will give same results or not, if it give same result the instrument is reliable (Dudovskiy, n.d.).

Construct Reliability
Cronbach's Cronbach's alpha shows the internal consistency within the items of the questionnaire as a group. Cronbach's alpha with 0.8 are excellent, 0.7 is good and acceptable and 0.6 shows the poor reliability (Sekharan, 2016). According to the table no. 3 Cronbach's alpha of each variable is acceptable except green packaging attitude and environmental concern which both have less than 0.7 which shows poor reliability.

Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021
[18] However composite reliability is same as Cronbach's alpha used to measure internal consistency of items, but composite reliability is highly preferred by researchers because it provides more accurate results compare to Cronbach's alpha (Peterson RA, 2013). As shown in table no. 3 composite reliability of each variable is above 0.8 which is indicating excellent reliability of instrument so, we will go ahead with composite reliability.

Validity
Validity is the measurement for the accuracy of items included in questionnaire to find the accurate data (Heale, 2015).

Discriminant Validity
Discriminant validity ensures that the measures are used for the construct in a quantitative survey should not be correlated to each other (Hubley, 2014). Fornell-Larcker Criterion is the method to evaluate the discriminant validity. This method do a comparison between the square root of the average variance extracted (AVE) with the correlation of latent variables. Value of latent variable and its indicator must be equal and greater than the other constructs variable, value of FLC must be above than 0.70 (Hamid, 2017).
According to table 4, value of each variable lies under the criteria, green packaging attitude is 0.78, environmental concern is 0.75 & green purchase intention is 0.74 and willingness to pay more is 0.8 which is above and indicates good result so, this shows that discriminant validity exists in the questionnaire.

Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021
[19] HTMT ratio is another method for the evaluation of discriminant validity. This method measures the similarity between latent variables in the questionnaire. The value for HTMT must be less than 0.9 for the establishment of discriminant validity (Henseler, 2014). Table 5 shows that values are below the criteria so, discriminant validity has been established.

Construct validity
Construct validity evaluates that the questionnaire is used to measure the construct must match with which you want to measure (Middleton., 2019)   Path coefficient is a method of examining the effect of within the variables system, it shows the effect of independent variables on the dependent variables (Aman, 2020).
T-statistics show the strength between the independent and dependent variables. In the given table 7 T-statistics value of all variables green packaging attitude, environmental concern and willingness to pay more is accurate and according to the rule of thumb which is indicating significant results. P-value show the significance level of the independent variable towards dependent variable, its value should be less than 0.05 then the null hypothesis will be true (Salkind, 2010). Table 7 indicates that the P value of dependent variables green packaging attitude, environmental concern and willingness to pay more has accurate values which are representing significant relationship with the dependent variable green purchase intention.  (Minitab, 2013). According to the rule of thumb R square value is 0.6 and adjusted R square is 0.592 which is model is fit.  Results were in support of previous researches and indicated that people with the concern for the environment have a more intention to purchase green packaged products, youth have a more concern for the environment. Consumers' attitude is high for a sustainable packaging and they are willing to pay more for the green packaging.

CONCLUSION
We know that nowadays marketers highly witness the revolutionary change in the marketing trends. Marketing is a source that saves the time of the customers and another reason is the availability of the variety of the product or their packaging. So here in our research, we talk about green packaging. Green packaging means eco-friendly packaging. The concept of green packaging is for a sustainable environment. Global warming is badly affecting human beings which affect them harmfully. Nowadays a sustainable environment is very necessary for us, for our animals and other nature. The environmental issue is a major issue like carbon and pollution. So, the world is going towards technological changes so because of those changes Journal of Marketing Strategies, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2021 [23] people are facing different challenges due to pollution. So here we are investigating the attitude of customers' towards green packaging in the context of Sapphire clothing.
The clothing brand sapphire started a green shopping bag for its customers and the environment. It means when customers use their product and then they throw the packing so by that packing the environment is not being harmful to the customers or the consumers.
Nowadays customers are aware of green packaging and many of them want that green packaging. And customers now prefer to purchase green packaging products and reduce the other packing. Eco-friendly packaging plays an important role in our environment. The companies must use informative, impressive packaging which helps to create awareness and help to change the customers' perception regarding their packaging. Our research shows that green packaging will easily change the purchasing power of customers and help to create a strong and positive impact on the mind of the customers.
Then here we talk about customers' attitude which has a very important role. Green packaging is expensive, many people cannot afford it but when people aware that it is very good for the environment, that's why to purchase it. Sapphire the clothing brand started the "Go Green" concept and came with eco-friendly shopping bags. Their seeds filled shopping bags encourage the customers to grow plants. Customers are satisfied with that green packaging. Many researchers have done worked on green packaging in different industries. This study will help the organizations to make strategies for green packaging.
Data was collected online through a questionnaire survey, we got different responses from a different age of people. 167 people participated in data collection, from which we analyzed the data through SPSS and PLS-SEM. Findings indicated that all independent variables were in a significant relationship with the dependent variable and the findings relate with the results of previous researchers. Consumer attitude has a positive and strong impact on the purchase intention for green packaging. Environmental concern has a significant impact on the green purchase intention, people have a concern about the sustainable environment and moving towards the purchase of green packaging to make the environment sustainable. Willing to pay more have a strong and positive impact on the green purchase intention. People are more willing to pay for the green packaging due to eco-logical concerns for the environment. Mostly youth is in the favor of purchasing green packaging.