4.7 Case Epsilon 79
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confusion on customer side regarding certificates it is necessary to provide more
insights on the concept.
A second challenge the organization is facing is difficult collaboration withsuppliers, as stated by the interviewee: “The biggest challenge was to convince our
suppliers to disclose their list of ingredients” (see Appendix: German Quote 31). In the
evaluation process for a Cradle-to-Cradle certificate all ingredients in a product have
to be analyzed. Hence, for the certification process suppliers have to disclose the
ingredients and exact formulas for all components of the product. At the beginning
not every supplier was willing to do so. Several discussions as well as long term,
trustful relationships are necessary to convince suppliers to take part in this process.
The last challenge is the low price level for virgin resources. Using circular re-sources in the production process and reusing them is more expensive than buying
and using virgin resources. Recycling a chair today means losing money for the
organization just for the fact that virgin resource prices are currently at such a low
level. Due to the longevity of the products the organization expects the first chairs
to be brought back for recycling in 10-15 years and by then the situation regarding
the resource prices could be different. The interviewee sees it as follows: “Currently
it is cheaper to buy new resources. In 10-15 years that will be different. Let’s look at the
example of aluminum: the major part of the expenses of aluminum is energy for the
extraction. Today energy is quite cheap but in 10 years it will not be cheap anymore.
Costs for electricity will increase which means that prices for resources will rise” (see
Appendix: German Quote 32).
4.7.4 Economic Impacts
The first impact the organization expects is potential savings through reused re-
sources. The organization anticipates the price of virgin resources to increase. If
this happens, the organization will realize a huge benefit in the reusing of materials
used to make their products. By collecting old chairs at the end of their lifecycle, the
organization sees a chance to obtain easy access to reusable resources. The interview
partner said that “there is growing interest in the option to return products after 10-15
years. This means our warehouse is currently the customer” (see Appendix: German
Quote 33). Organization Epsilon is convinced that customers will return their chairs
at the end of their product lifecycle and believes that minimal effort is required to
refurbish resources in order to be able to reuse them to produce a new chair. This
benefit currently only exists in theory because the chairs are highly durable and
consequently none have been brought back to the company so far.