The reactivity of copper(II) acetate as catalyst in a standard C-O coupling reaction has been systematically evaluated. Optimization of the reaction conditions resulted in a protocol involving stoichiometric amounts of reagents, a substoichiometric amount of base and 20 mol% catalyst, at 50 degrees C in 1,2-dichloroethane and under 1 atm O-2. Next, the reactivity of polymer-supported copper(II) acetate was evaluated. Although it is found that, in contrast to previous results obtained in related C-N coupling reactions, the polymer-supported catalyst is in this case less efficient than the corresponding homogeneous one, the catalyst turns out to be conveniently recovered from the reaction mixture by simple filtration. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.