Survey

In 2007, Office Depot conducted a survey to 150 of its customers. The survey questions were based around a range of environmental issues. The results were as follows:

89% of respondents seek environmentally preferable products when purchasing office products.

When purchasing a product, most consideration is given to whether the product is:

• Recyclable
• Energy Saving
• Recycled
• Biodegradable
• Fairtrade

Other, less important, considerations included whether the product is rechargeable, refillable, remanufactured, FSC Certified or chlorine free.

Office Depot would like to minimise packaging waste from deliveries. When asked what happens to the packaging from their order

• 22% of respondents put the packaging in the bin
• 8% of respondents reuse it
• 70% of respondents recycle the packaging

If Office Depot offered to take back packaging, only 24% of respondents would be prepared to pay for this service

Office Depot asked if respondents would be prepared to pay for delivery of their orders in returnable plastic boxes. 33% of respondents would be prepared to pay for the service although there was a lot of interest in having the service 'free' as standard.

Office Depot are members of certain environmental organisations and have several environmental accreditations. For respondents, it was most important that Office Depot is a member of ISO14001, FSC and WWF UK Forest and Trade Network

Only 26% of respondents said that there were environmentally preferable products that they wished to purchase which were not available from their stationery supplier.

Office Depot is looking at its overall impact on the environment and found that respondents were very interested in:

• The logistic impact of providing an office product delivery service
• The Carbon Footprints and environmental impacts of products
• The social and ethical impacts or products
• 'Closing the loop' options

Respondents were less interested in purchasing carbon offsets.

Providing environmentally preferable products and services will continue to be of high importance to Office Depot. When asked how important environmental considerations are to the respondent's relationship with Office Depot

• A massive 76% said that it is of high importance
• 24% said that it is of medium importance
• Only 1% said that it is of low importance

Respondents also want Office Depot to keep them informed of new environmentally preferable products and pro-actively suggest innovative ways of improving the impact they have on the environment. It was widely considered that Office Depot should reduce packaging on deliveries, as well as switching to e-billing and e-invoicing, saving on paper. There was some confusion over the environmental associations with which Office Depot has membership - what they do and what their policies are. Clearer directive compliance labelling was also requested. Cost, especially for the charity sector, is one of the main reasons given for not always buying environmentally preferable office products.

Results from the Ipsos MORI Climate Change survey can be found here.