Exploring the role of green brand extensions and greenwashing in the fashion industry

Consumers’ increasing awareness of sustainability is reshaping con-sumption patterns, prompting fashion companies to adopt envir-onmentally friendly initiatives. Certain fashion companies opt forbrand extensions, whereas others create entirely new brand lines.Some companies even turn to greenwashing, conveying unsub-stantiated claims about the eco-friendliness of their products. Thisstudy explored the combined influence of brand strategy (brandextension versus new brand name) and the presence/absence ofgreenwashing claims on a fictitious fashion brand company’s web-site on consumers’ purchase intentions. The results of our 2 × 2between-subjects experiment show a significant interaction effect,highlighting that greenwashing significantly and adversely influ-ences purchase intentions when fashion companies choose to usea new brand name for their innovative sustainable fashion clothingline. This study contributes valuable insights into consumerresponses to different brand strategies and greenwashing in thepursuit of sustainable fashion choices.