Conceptual development of a sustainable business approach

Recently, environmental issues have become critical for the community which has recognized the great pressure exerted by our business models in the environment. Consequently, we observe an incipient interest on the development of sustainable business models. This paper presents a reference framework in which different aspects, independent at first, become correlated: natural environment, purchasing policies, intermediaries and transport, retail practices, marketplace and value-adding processes. As a result, we extract various important implications for both research and management of sustainable models.