amounts to the total costs. The competitiveness of products consequently depends on competitive purchase costs which include search, information and transportation costs, and risks that the consumer senses, especially for sustainable products. Requirements for marketing campaigns in mass media require a high availability of product. Use costs Use costs emerge after the purchase of goods within the period of use, and are frequently related to energy consumption and the amount of maintenance required. For the successful launch of products, this requires an emphasis on saving potentials, especially in the case of sustainable products. Use costs assessment also enables customers to consider future costs more adequately. Switching costs of consumers are also included in use costs. Switching costs occur due to the inconvenience and risks caused by possible changes in use patterns. Understandable, interesting and broadly available information about the use and use costs of a product is essential, and reduces switching costs significantly. Sufficient employees training is necessary to ensure a profound level of product knowledge, especially for sales personnel in the sustainability branch. Post-use costs Post-use costs are classified as both direct and indirect costs. Direct post-use costs are directly paid by the consumer and occur due to the disposal and transportation of the products. An efficient measurement used to lower post-use costs is the extension of product life cycles through repair, reuse or upgrading of used products. The result is a reduction of the general throughput of resources. In the case of indirect costs, the producer manages the disposal, resale or recycling of products after their period of use, following the ‘extended producer responsibility’ concept which is already common in several OECD countries. Consumers may barter used products, return them for money, donate them or receive leasing return. The purpose of this concept is to encourage the companies to reduce waste. This may be achieved by designing processes more efficiently, increasing recycling and establishing markets for secondary materials. Emerging new cost structures may lead to increasing or decreasing market prices, depending on the trade-off between material savings and compliance costs for disposal and recycling. Customer’s awareness of total cost Consumers tend to base their buying decisions on incomplete and biased information about total costs of products which is referred to as bounded rationality. Sufficient calculations of savings due to lower use costs (e.g. energy consumption) and trade-offs are not possible under these conditions, although savings are probable. This