The Green Option Matrix to Characterize Green Products and Practices : Applications to the Upholstered Furniture and the Footwear Industries

Hybrid cars, recycled products, photovoltaic cells, bioplastics: why so different products can be called ‘green’? Which practices companies willing to develop green products should implement? How companies can easily and effectively communicate to stakeholders the environmental features of their green products? This paper tries to answer these questions, by developing a Green Option Matrix (GOM), which characterizes green products and practices along different dimensions. This matrix is then used to analyze the different features of green products as well as related green practices developed by a sample of companies belonging to two manufacturing industries, namely upholstered furniture and footwear. Green products and practices developed by each company in the sample are positioned in the matrix and results are presented and discussed for each industrial sector. The proposed matrix can be used by companies as a market tool to analyze competitors’ green products and practices and as a communication tool to effectively communicate to stakeholders the specific green features of their products and practices.