Analysis of Companies’ Approach to Sustainable Products Development: Quality, Environment, Society, Cost

Abstract

Sustainable product development is becoming essential to meet market, but also climate challenges. However, this is problematic mainly because of the need to make many complex decisions at the early stages of product development. Due to limited research in this area, the aim was to analyse the approach of companies to sustainable development when designing new products and improving products already on the market. This approach was considered according to the key aspects of sustainable product development, i.e.: quality (customer satisfaction with use), environment (impact in the life cycle), society (changes in the social environment) and cost. Pilot studies were conducted among manufacturing companies. These were surveys with a Likert scale, in which the following were verified: i) the frequency of actions taken regarding verified aspects, and ii) the degree to which these aspects were taken into account during product development. It was shown, for example, that the most frequently undertaken actions are those related to product costs, then quality, and slightly less often, environment and society. A similar phenomenon was observed in the case of the degree to which these aspects were taken into account in product development activities, which was additionally confirmed by the results of statistical analysis according to the sign test in the STATISTICA program. The results of the pilot studies confirmed the validity of conducting in-depth fundamental studies to determine clear rules and relationships that condition the consideration of key aspects within the framework of sustainable product development.