Raising consumer demand for longer lasting products: challenges and opportunities

Main findings

Increasing uptake of longer lasting products has the potential to reduce carbon emissions, foster sustainable consumption and contribute to a circular economy, while supporting the UK Government’s economic and environmental aspirations in its industrial and clean growth strategies.

Consumer expectations of product lifetimes appear to have declined over the past 25 years, and are lower than those of their European counterparts.

Evidence of generally high levels of satisfaction with product lifetimes, with a mean satisfaction level of 81% across a range of durable goods, suggests a need for government and business-led initiatives to encourage the uptake of longer lasting products.

Substantial consumer interest in longevity, reliability and guarantee length could be supported through measures such as mandatory lifetime labelling and longer guarantees.

In order to increase consumer uptake of longer lasting products and lengthen use times interdisciplinary research is required, informed by fields of enquiry such as behavioural economics, marketing, social psychology and social practice theory.