Exploring consumer acceptance of furniture renting services: the case of students in Lund

Furniture industry is slowly transitioning towards the circular economy. Renting furniture can potentially increase its circularity, extend furniture life, and postpone furniture entering end-of-life phase. However, academic research and practice of renting furniture and furnishing services is still relatively limited. Theoretically, it falls within the product-service systems literature where calls for more empirical studies of especially consumer behaviour have been heard. We respond to these calls by exploring consumer acceptance of potential furnishing and furniture rental among students at Lund University, Sweden. We combined a literature review on consumer acceptance of PSS with a survey of 150 students in Lund. The survey focused on understanding the current situation with furniture rental. The survey results were then analysed and followed up with 15 in-depth interviews with students that discussed what kinds of furniture and furnishing products the students would like to rent and what kinds of services they would want to be included in the furniture renting service. This study demonstrates that there exists a promising demand for furniture rental services among students in Lund. It identified critical product and service features that should be taken into consideration by potential furniture rental providers. Although this study focused on a specific case of furniture rental in Lund, our findings are of interest to other similar audiences of rental services.