Sustainability ambassadorship: the role of the store manager in development of in-store sustainability communication

The food industry, in general, and the retail grocery sector, in particular, have gone through an extensive transformation regarding sustainability communication. The retail grocery store is the stage on which in-store sustainability communication is triggered and incentivized. This paper focuses on the role of the store manager and is guided by the purpose to explore what roles and functions a store manager may perform as sustainability ambassador, and in what ways the dynamics between the central and store level may influence how sustainability is reflected and communicated in the retail store. The study draws on a qualitative and interpretative approach. The empirics are based on interviews with retail store managers in three Swedish grocery retailers. Through our empirical investigation, six different actions have been identified that both separately and in combination contribute to the field by giving a more nuanced view of what role and functions a store manager may perform as sustainability ambassador.