Corporate Responsibility via Community Betterment: A case study from the pallet industry
Keywords:
community betterment, corporate responsibility, marketing, palletsAbstract
Community betterment is a little-known component of corporate responsibility, and yet one that could be pursued by nearly all wood-based manufacturers. While considerable research has investigated how wood and forest-related companies adopt traditional corporate responsibility initiatives, little work has been done concerning how industry executives relate to their communities. In order to better understand these relationships we surveyed pallet industry executives regarding their opinions on whether companies should contribute to the betterment of their local communities. We utilized secondary data to explore the communities’ crime indexes, population sizes, unemployment levels, education of residents, and percentages of annual resident turnover. We differentiated between firms based on their marketing expertise, and the extent to which they were hiring. Results suggest that a relationship exists between local community conditions, namely low annual resident turnover and high formal education, and an executive’s beliefs about whether a firm should play a role in bettering its community. Executives who reported a belief in bettering their community were also with firms that had greater marketing expertise, and were increasing in size compared to their counterparts.
References
Andreasen, A. R. (1994). Social Marketing: Its Definition and Domain. Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, 13, 108–114.
Andzenge, D. T. (1991). Crime and Development: A Comparative Analysis. Dissertations. Western Michigan University. Paper 2034.
Backhaus, K. B., Stone, B. A., & Heiner, K. (2002). Exploring the Relationship Between Corporate Social Performance and Employer Attractiveness. Business & Society, 41, 292-318.
Barnett, M. L. (2016). The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: A Critique and Indirect Path forward. Business & Society, 1-24.
Besser, T. L. (1998). The Significance of Business to Community Social Responsibility. Rural Sociology, 63(3), 412-431.
Besser, T. L. (1999). Community involvement and the perception of success among small business operators in small towns. Journal of Small Business Management, 37(4), 16–29.
Besser, T. L., & Miller, N. (2001). Is the good corporation dead? The community social responsibility of small business operators. The Journal of Socio-Economics, 30(3), 221–241.
Besser, T. L., & Miller, N. J. (2004). The Risks of Enlightened Self-Interest: Small Businesses and Support for Community. Business and Society, 43(4), 398-425.
Borzaga, C., & Defourny, J. eds. (2001). Companies have a role in bettering local employment: The Emergence of Social Enterprise. Routledge, New York, NY.
Bridger, J. C., & Alter, T. R. (2006). Place, Community Development, and Social Capital. Community Development, 37(1).
Carrano, A.L., Thorn, B.K. & Woltag, H. (2014). Characterizing the carbon footprint of wood pallet logistics. Forest Products Journal, 64 (7/8), 232-241.
Carroll, A. (1991). The pyramid of corporate social responsibility: toward the moral management of organizational stakeholders. Business Horizons, 34(4), 39-48.
Carroll, A. (2016). Carroll’s pyramid of CSR: taking another look. International Journal of Corporate Social Responsibility, 1(3).
Carroll, A. B., & Shabana, K. M. (2010). The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: A Review of Concepts, Research and Practice. International Journal of Management Reviews, 12(1), 85–105.
Chisolm, P. (2018). Why Hospitals are Getting in the Real Estate Business. National Public Radio, August 19, 2018. Viewed September 10, 2018: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/08/19/639415302/why-hospitals-are-getting-into-the-real-estate-business
Combs, J. G., & Ketchen, D. J. (1999). Explaining interfirm cooperation and performance: Toward a reconciliation of predictions from the resource-based view and organizational economics. Strategic Management Journal, 20(9), 867–888.
Dillman, D. A., Smyth, J. D., & Christian, L. M. (2008). Internet, Mail, and Mixed-Mode Surveys: The Tailored Design Method, 3rd Edition. Wiley, New York, NY.
Dunn, M., Vlosky, R. & Shupe, T. (2000). The pallet industry in the southern United States. Forest Products Journal, 50(10), 30-34.
Dutton, J. E., Dukerich, J. M., & Harquail, C. V. (1994). Organization Images and Member Identification. Administration Science Quarterly, 39, 239-263.
Ferreira, J. J., M., Fernandes, C. I., Raposo, M., Thurik, R., & Faria, J. R. (2016). Entrepreneur location decisions across industries. International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, 12(4), 985-1006.
Fombrun, C. J., Gardberg, N. A., & Barnett, M. L. (2000). Opportunity Platforms and Safety Nets: Corporate Citizenship and Reputational Risk. Business and Society Review, 105, 85-106.
Gabriel, S. A., & Rosenthal, S. S. (2004). Quality of the Business Environment Versus Quality of Life: Do Firms and Households Like the Same Cities? The Review of Economics and Statistics, 86(1), 438–444.
Gallo, P. J., & Christensen, L. J. (2011). Firm Size Matters: An Empirical Investigation of Organizational Size and Ownership on Sustainability-Related Behaviors. Business & Society, 50(2), 315 – 349.
Godfrey, P.C., Merrill, C. B., & Hansen, J. M. (2009). The Relationship Between Corporate Social Responsibility and Shareholder Value: An Empirical Test of the Risk Management Hypothesis. Strategic Management Journal, 30, 425-445.
Grace, P., Nelson, H. & Kozak, R. (2018). Understanding SME success in the value-added forest products sector: insights from British Columbia. Bioproducts Business, 3(9), 107-117.
Graham, M. (2012). White Collar Crime and the United States Economy. Honor’s Thesis, University of New Hampshire Scholars’ Repository, Paper 49.
Greening, D. W., & Turban, D. B. (2000). Corporate Social Performance as a Competitive Advantage in Attracting a Quality Workforce. Business & Society, 39, 254-280.
Han, X., & Hansen, E. (2012). Corporate social responsibility implementation in the global forest sector. Journal of Corporate Citizenship, (47), 101-118.
Han, X. & Hansen, E. (2017). Marketing organization and implementation in private US sawmilling companies. Bioproducts Business, 2(1), 1-13.
Hildebrand, D., Sen, S., & Bhattacharya, C. B., (2011). Corporate Social Responsibility: A Corporate Marketing Perspective. European Journal of Marketing, 45(9/10), 1353–1364.
Hovde, H. T. (1943). The Marketing Viewpoint in Planning for Community Betterment. American Marketing Association, 7(4), 337-341.
Kahn, J., & Henderson, D. (1992). Location preferences of family firms: Strategic decision of “home sweet home”? Family Business Review, 5(3), 271-282.
Kanuk, L., & Berenson, C. (1975). Mail surveys and response rates: A Literature review. Journal of Marketing Research, 12(4), 440–453.
Kimelberg, S. M., & Williams, E. (2013). Evaluating the importance of business location factors: The influence of facility type. Growth and Change, 44(1), 92.
Lepoutre, J., & Heene, A. (2006). Control for firm size: Investigating the Impact of Firm Size on Small Business Social Responsibility: A Critical Review. Journal of Business Ethics, 67(3), 257–273.
Levitt, T. (1958). The dangers of social responsibility. Harvard Business Review, 36(5): 41–50.
Maignan, I., & Ferrell, O. C. (2004). Corporate Social Responsibility and Marketing: An Integrative Framework. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 32(1), 3–19.
Makaros, A., & Zehavi, T. (2008). Corporate Social Responsibility to the Community: A Process-oriented Model for Contractual Relations, Community Development, 39(4).
Elser, N. & Michael, J. (2019). A strategic orientation toward entrepreneurship: implications for pallet manufacturer success. Forest Products Journal, 68(4), 452-458.
Morgan, N. A., Vorhies, D. W., & Mason, C. H. (2009). Market Orientation, Marketing Capabilities, and Firm Performance. Strategic Management Journal, 30, 909-920.
Panwar, R. Rinne, T. Hansen, E. & Juslin, H. (2006). Corporate Social Responsibility: balancing economic, environmental, and social issues in the forest products industry. Forest Products Journal, 56(2), 4-12.
Porter, M. E., & Kramer, M. R. (2002). The Competitive Advantage of Corporate Philanthropy. Harvard Business Review, 80(12), 56–68.
Rabianski, J. S., DeLisle, J. R., & Carn, N. G. (2001). Corporate real estate site selection: A community-specific information framework. The Journal of Real Estate Research, 22(1), 165-197.
Toker, Z. (2015). Walking Beyond the Socioeconomic Status in an Objectively and Perceptually Walkable Pedestrian Environment. Urban Studies Research, Article ID 919874, accessed April 16, 2016: http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2015/919874.
Turban, D. B., & Greening, D. W. (1997). Corporate Social Performance and Organizational Attractiveness to Prospective Employees. Academy of Management Journal, 40(3), 658-672.
Vidal, N. G. & R. A. Kozak. (2008). Corporate responsibility practices in the forestry sector. Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 31, 59-75.
Voegtlin C., & Greenwood, M. (2016). Corporate social responsibility and human resource management: A systematic review and conceptual analysis. Human Resource Management Review, 26(3), 181-197.
Waddock, S. A., & Graves, S. B. (1997). Corporate Social Performance-Financial Performance Link. Strategic Management Journal, 18(4), 303-319.
Wang, Q., Dou, J., & Jia, S. (2016). A Meta-Analytic Review of Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Financial Performance: The Moderating Effect of Contextual Factors. Business & Society, 55(8), 1083-1121.
Wójcik, P. (2018). The business case for corporate social responsibility: A literature overview and integrative framework, Journal of Management and Business Administration: Central Europe, 26(1), 121-148.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Manuscripts published in the journal are open access and copyrighted according to the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) which requires attribution to the author, but can be readily shared and adapted. BioProducts Business allows the author(s) to retain publishing rights without restrictions.
