good taste of culture and art: a cause-related marketing strategy

Package claims influence product perceptions. Specifically, prosocial information concerning sustainable organisational practices improves product evaluation. This research evaluates the effect of supporting cultural and artistic activities as a claim that influences taste evaluations. Taste is a metaphor for an emotional response to products. We conducted a mixed model experiment: The claim “Supports cultural/artistic activities” is the between-group variable, and four fruits are the within-subject variable (i.e., guava, pineapple, red apple, and green grapes). Descriptive statistics and a MANOVA analysis show that the sweet and umami taste is enhanced when fruits hold the cultural/artistic claim. This effect is not observed for the sour and bitter taste. Therefore, the results confirm the taste metaphor. Within the cause-related marketing literature, it is possible to interpret that supporting the culture/arts industry has a symbolic meaning for the consumer.