Fashion ESG Marketing Typology and Effect Discourse: Text-Based Analysis of Domestic and International Fashion Brands

This study develops a fashion-industry-specific ESG marketing typology by analyzing how environmental (E), social (S), and governance (G) activities are communicated in brand-related texts. A corpus of 636 sentences and 217 standardized keywords was constructed from ESG-related news articles, press releases, and official website materials concerning ten domestic and international fashion brands (2020–2025). Using qualitative content analysis with structured keyword coding, the study identifies five high-level ESG marketing types and twelve sub-strategy types across the E/S/G dimensions. ESG communication is further examined through five effect-related discourse categories: brand trust, purchasing behavior, relationship and loyalty, competitiveness and risk management, and corporate value and supply chain stability. Findings show that brands systematically link ESG activities to these effect categories through recurrent discursive patterns rather than verified performance outcomes. Comparative analysis indicates that international brands tend to frame ESG as a long-term managerial and governance-based framework integrated into corporate operations, whereas domestic brands emphasize visible environmental initiatives and community-oriented projects, producing a more execution-centered ESG discourse. The study offers a systematic typology and discourse-based analytical framework that can inform future quantitative and mixed-method research on fashion ESG marketing.