TIMBER
FIRMING UP ON UNCERTAINTY M
Equip yourself with the knowledge to tackle uncertainty head-on, says David Hopkins, CEO of the Timber Trade Federation.
any merchant businesses are wary of spending on promotion when markets are uncertain. And who can blame them, with the
Federation of Master Builders’ (FMB) Q4 2020 State of the Trade report finding that only 4 in 10 builders are seeing rising workloads, and 1 in 4 builders struggling to hire carpenters to undertake works for customers. Regional housebuilders are acknowledging the potential for significant economic uncertainties in 2021, especially with the end of the Stamp Duty Holiday in March, and uncertainties in post-Brexit trade policy are also affecting some product supply chains. Yet there are, as singer Ian Dury once put it, ‘Reasons to be Cheerful’. The emerging National Retrofit Strategy, first proposed by the FMB and endorsed by the Construction Leadership Council just before Christmas, could provide a measure of recovery in the RMI sector, though contractors need to be registered with the government’s Trusted Trader scheme to become a Green Homes Grant Installer. Timber, the merchant’s most profitable category, has a role to play in retrofit, whether as wood fibre insulation or as framing, flooring for insulated lofts, and much more.
As American mathematician Claude Shannon, the ‘father of information theory’ once put it: “information is the resolution of uncertainty”. Promoting to builders your awareness of the retrofit opportunities, and your readiness to supply, starts with having the right information. The Timber Trade Federation, in conjunction with our partners at the NMBS, has produced a special information leaflet for merchants covering wood products for retrofit projects. It is available for free download at
ttf.co.uk/ merchants/merchant-resources. Make sure you know which products to recommend to your customer base.
On the other side of the supply equation, the Major Contractors Group of the National Federation of Builders (NFB) also launched in mid-December a set of practical tools for its members to accelerate their progress towards Net Zero carbon emissions in construction projects. Using timber wherever possible in construction locks away CO2 in the wood fibre for the lifetime of the building. It is one of the surest ways of reducing embodied carbon in buildings. The architects’ professional body RIBA has also launched programmes on both
18 Steico_Insulation
BSW Timber loft space retrofit and embodied carbon.
Another ‘reason to BSW Timber loft space be cheerful’ is the increasing direct involvement of local authorities and housing associations in growing the supply of social and affordable homes. Those merchants able to investigate and insert themselves into this supply pipeline may thus benefit from being a part of the £12 billion government investment to support the creation of affordable homes which has been promised for the spending round commencing this year.
STEICO Flex retro fit.
Merchants working with their timber suppliers have, in the past, been able to put forward viable offerings to housing supply procurement managers, and may well be able to do so again. Whether your business supplies small contractors working for major national construction firms, or local authorities and housing associations, regional housebuilders, or individual local jobbing builders, timber is the material of the moment. With its environmental credentials riding high, and with the UN’s COP 26 environmental conference coming to the UK later this year, it’s a great time to promote timber’s pro-climate reputation and to capitalise on its profitability to your business. BMJ
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net February 2021
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