forum ware - DGWT - Deutsche Gesellschaft für Warenkunde und ...

94
SHORT VERSIONS (FORUM WARE INTERNATIONAL)
Empirical Survey
For the empirical survey, the authors analyzed 164 Web sites from Austrian Top 500 companies’
representing the following industry sectors: Optical Industry (incl. Photography), Home and Personal Care,
Energy, Textile Industry and the Food Industry. The industry sectors were chosen among the complete range
of sectors given by the Austrian Top 500 companies based on the precondition that they participate in Business
to Consumer (B2C) e-Commerce, in order to ensure comparability. The above defined commodity
characteristics (core and additive characteristics) are used as items to sort and classify the content of the
surveyed Web sites employing three parameter values (Not mentioned, Mentioned, Details provided). The
results of the empirical survey show that the Web Sites vary greatly in the disclosure of the different items: as
far as the core characteristics are concerned, information about variety and usage was found to be displayed
often, whereas information on raw materials, production processes and composition was quite rare. Referring
to the additive characteristics most of the Web sites display no relevant information about quality,
environmental aspects, product testing or prices.
Test of Significant Differences
A Pearson's Goodness of Fit Chi-square and a Likelihood Ratio Chi-square were used to test for significant
differences between the sectors of the industry. By applying a Chi-square test (level of significance: 1 %) the
disclosure of raw materials, the production process, environmental information and prices were found to vary
significantly between the different sectors, while the disclosure of the composition, variety, usage, quality
information and product testing remains insignificant. Interestingly three of these items (variety, quality
information and product testing) become significant when applying a level of significance of 5 %. The mere
fact that the majority of the industry doesn't offer certain product-related information cannot be seen as an
indicator that the provision itself doesn't make sense. In some cases certain organizations successfully
differentiate themselves from the majority by providing information that goes into detail.
Conclusions
The findings show that commodity knowledge does not play a prominent role for the surveyed companies.
The degree of commodity knowledge on the analyzed Web sites varies visibly. The survey illustrates that the
companies are present online, but with regard to commodity knowledge the companies use the unlimited
information possibilities of the Internet only partly. Commodity knowledge could be seen as unnecessary or
too complicated to be communicated online. Maybe some companies look upon the commodity characteristics
of their products as corporate secrets. These information gaps represent unused communication potential. In
times of sustainable development consumers are more and more interested about the background of the
products they buy and profound online information about the commodity characteristics would address this
need.
* Michael K. Pieber, Horst Treiblmaier, Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, Department of
technology and sustainable product management, Augasse 2-6, A-1090 Vienna, Austria, Tel.: +43 1 31336 4801,
Fax: +43 1 31336 706, E-mail: michael.pieber@wu-wien.ac.at
FORUM WARE 32 (2004) NR. 1 - 4