Forage for Thought: Mobilizing Codes in the Movement for Grass-Fed Meat and Dairy Products

This study illuminates how new markets emerge and how social movements can effect cultural change through market creation. We suggest that social movements can fuel solutions to three challenges in creating new market segments: entrepreneurial production, the creation of collective producer identiti...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Administrative science quarterly 2008-09, Vol.53 (3), p.529-567
Main Authors: Weber, Klaus, Heinze, Kathryn L., Desoucey, Michaela
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agricultural and food market
Animal products
Consumers
Cultural change
Dairy industry
Dairy products
Entrepreneurship
Exchange (Economics)
Family farms
Farmers markets
Food movements
Grasses
Group identity
Industrial agriculture
Market segments
Marketing management
Markets
Meat industry
Meats
Organic farming
Producers
Production
Production planning
Ranching
Social activism
Social Movements
Studies
Sustainable agriculture
U.S.A
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Summary:This study illuminates how new markets emerge and how social movements can effect cultural change through market creation. We suggest that social movements can fuel solutions to three challenges in creating new market segments: entrepreneurial production, the creation of collective producer identities, and the establishment of regular exchange between producers and consumers. We use qualitative data on the grassroots coalition movement that has spurred a market for grass-fed meat and dairy products in the United States since the early 1990s. Our analysis shows that the movement's participants mobilized broad cultural codes and that these codes motivated producers to enter and persist in a nascent market, shaped their choices about production and exchange technologies, enabled a collective identity, and formed the basis of the products' exchange value.
ISSN:0001-8392
1930-3815
DOI:10.2189/asqu.53.3.529