Canadian Purchasing Rewards Moral Companies

Corporate citizenship - whether a company is perceived as doing business in a socially responsible manner - is affecting the purchasing decisions of Canadians, according to a poll by Ipsos-Reid. Significantly, majorities claim to have consciously 'rewarded' or 'punished' companies for this performance by making or rejecting a purchase from them.

The Canadian public gives companies fairly good marks for doing business in a socially responsible way. Three-quarters think that Canadian companies are doing a good job in terms of doing business in a socially responsible way but only 14% say 'very good' and 62% 'somewhat good'. At the other end of the scale, 16% say companies are doing a 'somewhat poor' job and 6% 'very poor'.

A majority of Canadians have rewarded or punished a company for their corporate citizenship in the last year. More than half (55%) say they have consciously decided to buy a product or service from one company over another because they felt the company was a good corporate citizen. About the same number (52%) have consciously refused to buy a product or a service from a company not conducting business in a socially responsible way. The latter figure rises to 58% among those aged 18-54 and falls to 40% of those over 55, whether because they are cynical, set in their ways or have some other reason, the survey does not speculate.

However, many think that companies who are good citizens are motivated more by their bottom line (68%) than because they care about being socially responsible (29%). Respondents claimed to find stories about good corporate behaviour more interesting than bad. More than two-thirds (68%) of Canadians say that a news story about a company that has been singled out for a very positive action is more likely to grab their attention than a story about a company that has been singled out for a very negative action (29%), perhaps because they imagine them to be more scarce.

Ipsos-Reid polled a representative cross-section of 1,000 Canadian adults between August 19 and 21.

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas unless otherwise stated.

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