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How Far the TBL Concept of Sustainable Entrepreneurship Extends Beyond the Various Sustainability Regulations: Can Greek Food Manufacturing Enterprises Sustain Their Hybrid Nature Over Time?

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Abstract

This study presents the design and selected results of a comprehensive research on measuring the concept of sustainable entrepreneurship. We used the methodology of conjoint analysis and developed a hierarchical framework that lists all the multi-attributes that exist in the triple bottom line concept. In doing so, we collected data from 150 Greek food companies. The multi-attributes were categorized and ranked into the following four headings: internal social values (ISV), external social values (ESV), environmental values (ENV) and economic values (ECV). Specifically, we found that the creation of values that improve the safety and hygiene issues of products to consumers is the most important attribute for the ISV domain. Respectively, the most important attribute for the ESV domain is the creation of values that impact on the local economy. Accordingly, the creation of values for minimizing environmental impacts was found as the most important attribute for the ENV domain. And lastly, the establishment of ECV that increase long-run profitability was identified as the most important for the ECV dimension. Finally, all the categorized values offer rich feedback for entrepreneurship scholars and parishioners. And, to that extent, our findings are slightly different from those reported in previous researches to other contexts, as we have managed to build an aggregated instrument that promotes the hybrid nature of food companies towards international development.

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Fig. 1

Source Based on the ‘triple bottom line’ as per Binder and Belz (2013)

Fig. 2

Source Own display based on the survey database

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Business Administration, University of Macedonia, 156 Egnatia Street, 54006, Thessaloníki, Greece

    Theodore Tarnanidis, Jason Papathanasiou & Demetres Subeniotis

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  1. Theodore Tarnanidis
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  2. Jason Papathanasiou
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  3. Demetres Subeniotis
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Correspondence to Theodore Tarnanidis.

Appendices

Appendix 1

See Table 7.

Table 7 Sample of discussion questions
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Appendix 2

See Table 8.

Table 8 SE dimensions and attributes
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Appendix 3

See Table 9.

Table 9 An example of trade-off paired comparisons, Card 6: Which of the following two profiles from the Internal social values do you prefer? (Please rate the preferred profile using a rating sale 1–7)
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Tarnanidis, T., Papathanasiou, J. & Subeniotis, D. How Far the TBL Concept of Sustainable Entrepreneurship Extends Beyond the Various Sustainability Regulations: Can Greek Food Manufacturing Enterprises Sustain Their Hybrid Nature Over Time?. J Bus Ethics 154, 829–846 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-017-3443-4

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