Exploring consumer interest in sustainable brands: a Google trends analysis of Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom (2015–2025)

Al-Kenane, Khalida and Alqathami, Mazen ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1061-9945 2026. Exploring consumer interest in sustainable brands: a Google trends analysis of Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom (2015–2025). Sustainability 18 (8) , 3990. 10.3390/su18083990

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Abstract

In this study, we examined cross-cultural interest in sustainable brands in Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom in 2015–2025 as a dynamic proxy of consumer behavior and public awareness through the Google Trends tool. Due to the increasing significance of sustainability marketing as a part of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) strategies, the research focuses on the evolution of sustainability discourse as influenced by cultural environment, language, and policy frameworks. Sustainability-related search terms in English and Arabic were gathered in Google Trends monthly and aggregated to eliminate short-term variability and were compared through nonparametric Wilcoxon rank-sum tests and time-stability tests. The findings demonstrate that there is more stable and higher public interest in issues that relate to sustainability in the UK, which is an indicator of a well-established ESG and regulatory climate. Contrarily, Saudi Arabia shows a significant upsurge in search transactions on sustainability-related topics that occurred after 2018, when the country started implementing reforms to Vision 2030 and launched more environmental programs. The results indicate the importance of policy context and language in the formation of sustainability awareness and show the usefulness of Google Trends as a useful cross-national sustainability and marketing research tool.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Published Online
Status:	Published
Schools:	Schools > Engineering
Additional Information:	License information from Publisher: LICENSE 1: URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, Start Date: 2026-04-17
Publisher:	MDPI
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	27 April 2026
Date of Acceptance:	7 April 2026
Last Modified:	29 Apr 2026 22:31
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/186637

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