Clients' involvement in environmental issues and organizational performance in businesses: an empirical analysis

The main aim of this work is to analyze to what extent clients' involvement in environmental issues leads to an improvement not only in the environmental performance, but also in other parameters, mainly those linked to organizational performance. To this end, a database of 110 companies of industrial businesses certified with ISO 14001 in Spain has been used. Among the main results we must emphasize the following ones. To take clients' environmental demands into account positively influences the business' competitive position derived from a green competitive advantage. Likewise, it has positive effects on the business' innovative capability, facilitating, in this way, the opening to international markets. In the same way, close environmental manufacturer client cooperation has a positive effect on the business' competitive position derived from a green competitive advantage and on its innovative capability and, as a result, on its opening to new geographical markets. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.