Biomimicry for the Wider Consumer Market
By Fiona van Iersel
Minerva Empowerment
Marketing Sustainability and Ethics
8 February 2026

Consumers do not all interpret “green” in the same way. That makes communication a practical design problem: which feature do we explain, and how do we connect it to what people value?

Gershoff and Frels (2015) examine how the centrality of a green attribute affects perceptions of a product’s greenness. A benefit connected to a defining feature can be perceived differently from the same benefit attached to something peripheral. The implication for a biomimicry product is to make the environmental feature’s role in the product clear, rather than rely on a vague nature-inspired label.

Biomimicry translates ideas from natural systems into design (Benyus, 1997). A communication strategy could begin with the natural system that inspired a feature and explain its intended environmental benefit. For another audience, the same feature might be introduced through durability or efficiency. The feature stays the same; the point of entry changes.

The useful next step is to connect that framing to a concrete feature. What does the design do? Why does that matter in everyday use? What evidence supports the environmental claim? Adjusting the message to different motivations can make sustainability more relevant without allowing the story to outrun the product (White, Habib, & Hardisty, 2019).

References

Benyus, J. M. (1997). Biomimicry: Innovation inspired by nature. HarperCollins.

Gershoff, A. D., & Frels, J. K. (2015). What makes it green? The role of centrality of green attributes in evaluations of the greenness of products. Journal of Marketing, 79(1), 97–110. https://doi.org/10.1509/jm.13.0303

White, K., Habib, R., & Hardisty, D. J. (2019). How to shift consumer behaviors to be more sustainable: A literature review and guiding framework. Journal of Marketing, 83(3), 22–49. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022242919825649