FSC in the United Kingdom retailer sector - February 28th, 2005

By Nick Cliffe FSC UK

In the United Kingdom (UK) there is a large market for certified products, in terms of both volume and value. Each year FSC UK assists in a project called the Ethical Purchasing Index which aims to track the size of the market for ethical products using sales data from nine major retailers. Last year their sales of FSC certified products in the UK exceeded 1.7 billion dollars. This is a market FSC UK has to support.

As a National Initiative operating in a developed FSC market there are many calls on our time and resources. Prioritising is not an easy task. In the UK, FSC has identified a number of key sectors with whom we seek to develop mutually beneficial partnerships. FSC is growing its expertise in these sectors to influence the market for certified product as well as to generate revenue.

The retail sector is one of the FSC UK's key sectors, though this may seem obvious considering the nature of the UK timber market (where consumption far outweighs production) it is always useful to examine other reasons for this decision:

1. Buying power It is through market pull that the UK can best support the expansion of FSC certification and the retail sector has enormous buying power. By working with, training and supporting the buying teams of major retailers we can have a direct impact on forest management as their buyers start to require FSC certification of all their suppliers.

2. Communication The promotional budget and activity of retailers are impressive. Their ability to reach consumers is vast as is their potential to raise FSC's brand recognition amongst the general public. You only have to look at the incredible results achieved by FSC Netherlands to see the potential.

3. Completing the chain The UK is starting to see retailers getting chain of custody (one major DIY shed has it in place, another is on the way). In part because they are all increasing their volume of business to business transactions (and so no longer represent the end of the chain) and also because it allows them to make all claims under one certificate number.

4. Revenue Generation The UK Working Group was started on a charitable basis, but as corporate donations are getting increasingly hard to secure the proportion of revenue derived from service provision must increase. Retailers are large potential customers for these services. Be it training and consultancy work, co-marketing ventures or even, in the future, brokering services.

5. Flow -on effect FSC involvement in the retailer sector has been a major contributior to the size of the market in the UK and awareness of FSC. This may have influenced government policy makers who recently specified FSC as a preferred certification system to meet their timber procurement guidelines.

Though there are more, these reasons hopefully summarise why the retail sector is of such importantace to the UK and perhaps might act as indicators to help assess how important they could be to other National Initiatives throughout the network.

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