Voluntary simplicity: A new consumption experience at people migrating from city to rural

Nowadays consumption habits are considered to cause environmental and psychological deterioration which creates the necessity to discover new philosophies. Voluntary simplicity movement is regarded as one of these philosophies that includes a diverse range of social movements, consisting of people who resist high-consumption lifestyles and seek alternatives to lower consumption but higher quality of life in various ways. Moreover individuals who have adopted voluntary simplicity has changed their living spaces by moving from urban to rural. The aim of this study is to explore the consumption habits of people, who has migrated from urban to rural, in the context of voluntary simplicity. The main contribution of this study would be adding new knowledge regarding this sample, which has not been discovered enough in terms of their consumption style and migration motivations. The study shelters qualitative methods due to the exploratory nature of the research. A semi-structured interview technique has been utilized to obtain the data, and ten people were interviewed in total. Phenomenological philosophy, which allows an interpretive approach, was adopted in the analysis of the findings. As a result, antecedents of voluntary simplicity; human scale, self-sufficiency, personal development, ecological awareness, material simplicity, and regardless of the premises of voluntary simplicity; food safety anxiety has been found to be effective factors in people's migrating to the village. Additionally, it is understood that the participants produced new ecological identities with migration. These identities also are guiding in terms of being a food producer and in conspicuous consumption. In addition, the premises that cause migration; It has been understood that it plays an effective role in routine consumption, conspicuous consumption, intense interest and low interest consumption decisions. It was observed that some of the participants turned towards impulsive purchases resulting from ecological identities produced. The consumption of products containing locally produced, organic, and natural messages, which comply with the understanding of volunteer simplicity, was not revealed in our participants. It was understood that the concerns about food health were caused by this situation. It has also been understood that marketing stimuli such as discount and sales promotion messages have been created in these individuals that shake the premise of autonomy (self-sufficiency). It is thought that these findings will make an essential contribution to companies that produce environmentally friendly products, future studies on urban migration and volunteer simplicity literature.