Abstract
Regenerative agriculture is gaining traction in agrifood value chains, yet its definitional ambiguity and the heterogeneity of consumer priorities create strategic challenges for commercialization. Firms commonly assume a homogeneous ‘sustainable consumer’ motivated by environmental outcomes, but research on consumer food values suggests that economic attributes often outweigh environmental concerns when trade-offs are required. This study segments U.S. consumers based on how they prioritize seven core attributes of regenerative agriculture: soil health, biodiversity, greenhouse gas emissions, water use, food prices, crop yield, and farmer profitability. Using forced-ranking data from 1231 nationally representative U.S. consumers surveyed in August 2024, we apply a two-stage clustering procedure to identify three distinct consumer segments: Practical Supporters (43%), who prioritize economic and farm-centric outcomes; Principled Supporters (30%), who emphasize environmental benefits; and Balanced Supporters (27%), who show moderate priorities across all dimensions. A multinomial logistic regression model achieves 99% classification accuracy (McFadden’s ρ²=0.88), producing a replicable tool for classifying new respondents. These findings show that economically oriented consumers outnumber environmentally oriented ones, challenging the prevailing strategic assumption. The segment structure has direct implications for product labeling, retail channel strategy, and the design of farmer incentive programs across the regenerative agriculture value chain.
Keywords
agribusiness strategy; consumer segmentation; regenerative agriculture
Date of this Version
7-16-2026
Recommended Citation
Monaco Neto, Lourival Carmo; Stevanin de Souza, Gustavo; Zakrzewski, Owen Jerome; and Gray, Allan Wayne, "From insight to impact: segmenting consumers by their regenerative agriculture priorities" (2026). Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications. Paper 66.
https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/agedocs/66
Comments
This is the publisher PDF of Monaco Neto, L. C., de Souza, G. S., Zakrzewski, O. J., & Gray, A. W. (2026). From insight to impact: segmenting consumers by their regenerative agriculture priorities. International Food and Agribusiness Management Review. Published CC-BY, the version of record and ADA Title II compliant version is available in HTML at DOI: 10.22434/ifamr.1537.