We present production-, industrial-, and institutional economic approaches to analyse the market behaviour of public forest enterprises in the Cantons Aargau and Graubünden. The goal is to improve the understanding of the market behaviour of wood market participants, and to assess the availability of wood under different conditions. The analyses are based on surveys as well as choice and trust experiments. Besides structural forest characteristics, forest economic aspects as well market structures and institutional particularities are presented. Comparing the study cantons reveals that not only the intensity of utilization varies, but also the preferred marketing channel structures. While in Graubünden about 80% of the stem wood is sold via bundling organisations and forest contractors, in Aargau direct selling prevails with about 70%. Long-term business relations dominate in both cantons. The presented results feed into a computer-based analysis of various wood market situations.