Ethical Retailing: Findings from Europe and the US

In our paper, we aim at integrating the two streams of literature on sustainability and ethics in retailing and the market practice theory in order to provide a better understanding of how sustainable and ethical practices shape the market. The market practice approach refers to practices developed all through the supply chain, in both an upstream and downstream perspective, where the pivotal role of the sustainable and ethically minded retailers takes place. The objective is to achieve a deeper knowledge of how market practices work, taking into consideration various (sustainable) retail formulas. Due to the exploratory nature of our aims, our research – in its early stages- must be qualitative. We analyse in depth some significant case studies in order to draw preliminary results about market practices in retailing.