Green marketing of consumer electronics. II

In the last few years women have taken a more and more active role in buying decisions on consumer electronics. Since they attach on average more value to environmental attributes than men this is an opportunity to promote ´green´ products. Environmental benefits have to be presented in conjunction with other benefits. It has been identified that well designed, durable and easy to use products are important for woman in this respect. Other aspects such as features and amount of power clearly count less. Sales staff in shops turn out to have an important influence on buying decisions; in approx. 50% of the cases their advice counts strongly. In their communication environmental issues play a subordinate role - which leaves room for improvement. Energy consumption in the use phase is ranked both by customers and sales staff as the most important issue to be addressed. This has implications for EcoDesign (design for environment) which up to now has put strong emphasis on materials application and recyclability