Consumer perceptions on responsibility of wood product suppliers in Finland

Today’s consumers often perceive an additional benefit associated with responsible business practices and sustainability of purchased products. Regarding wood products, environmental quality has in the earlier studies been found to be a part of the total product quality. However, there is still lack of knowledge on the consumers’ attitudes towards socially and environmentally responsible supplier characteristics. Therefore we address in this paper what kind of perceptions do consumers hold for their wood product suppliers particularly with regard to environmental and social responsibility. Our data is collected during 2004-2007 as exit data from home retail centers selling building materials and our respondents (n=227) were Finnish adult consumers. Perceived supplier characteristics associated were found to be linked with both domestic origin of wood and domestic company ownership. Based on this there seems to be some scope for developing wood products marketing based on these issues.