Green consumer survey: Slightly higher prices won’t hurt sales of environmentally friendly products
By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff -- Manufacturing Business Technology, 12/3/2007 3:59:00 PM
Twelve percent of U.S. adults—roughly 25 million Americans—are willing to pay extra for consumer electronics that use less energy or come from a company that is environmentally friendly, according to a new report from Cambridge, Mass.-based Forrester Research.
The report is based on a survey of 5,000 U.S. adults. "The green leadership position [in the consumer electronics space] is open,” says Christopher Mines, a Forrester Research senior VP. “Which manufacturer will create the iconic 'Prius' product in consumer electronics?"
The Forrester survey identified three distinct segments of U.S. technology consumers:
• Bright Greens: representing 12 percent of U.S. adults. These consumers are concerned about the environment and strongly agree that they would pay more for consumer electronics products that save energy or come from a company that is environmentally friendly.
• Responsible Greens: comprising 41 percent of U.S. adults. These 90 million consumers share concerns about environmental issues, but do not strongly agree that they would pay more for environmentally friendly products.
• Non-greens: the remaining 47 percent of U.S. adults. The rest of the population—96 million Americans—do not (yet) share the greens' concerns about the environment or global warming.
Among the major PC brands, Apple's customer base is the greenest, with 17 percent of its customers in the bright-green consumer category. Hewlett-Packard’s Compaq brand ranks second, with 13 percent of its customers in the bright-green category.
Many of the major consumer electronic manufacturers—including Apple, Dell, HP, Sony, and Toshiba—have taken early steps to make their operations and products green. Moving forward, Forrester expects marketers and designers of nearly all consumer technology products and services to embrace green principles like energy efficiency, lower-impact manufacturing, longer product life cycles, and recycling.
"All the green efforts of consumer technology manufacturers so far have been one-size-fits-all: They are not targeted at a particular segment of consumers, but apply across the board to a company's products, manufacturing, and supply chain," says Mines. "We fully expect green technology consumers to further emerge as a target segment for style-conscious electronics manufacturers as the industry moves beyond beige-box design."
The report, In Search Of Green Technology Consumers, can be purchased on the Forrester Research Web site.
