NEWS EXTRA: BMF CONFERENCE 2025
A LOOK BACK AT the conference agenda from 30 years ago, when the BMF last held a conference in Barcelona, shows that some topics are still prominent, BMF CEO John Newcomb announced, opening his conference address. “Take a look at some of the topics that were on the agenda back in 1995: what does the City expect from builders’ merchants, how will technology change the industry, how can we improve security? Even then, they were talking about cyber security. They also highlighted a Labour Government’s housing objectives. 30 years later we are still talking about these topics,” he said. Newcomb said that the merchant sector then – around 3,500 merchants - was very much about having a physical store with a large warehouse at the back. All the staff would have come from trade backgrounds, and customer loyalty and retention was built all around relationships. Online transactions were minimal, even though 1995 saw the start of Amazon and eBay. “That was 30 years ago, so, where is the BMF in 2025?” he continued. “We have 1020 members, the highest number that the BMF has ever had. We have 535 merchant members and 316 suppliers and 169 Service and Associate members.”
Newcomb highlighted the work that the BMF is doing to move forward. “We have developed four strategic themes that are the heart of everything we do. Number one is member engagement, as it is with most trade associations. We know that networking is the most powerful form of relationship building, we ran 25 product category forums, and sector forums, we ran 14 regional meetings, and six major events,
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PAST,
including our Top 100 Influencers dinner and our Members Day. Member Engagement is still our core strategic element.” Number two is government influence, a major concern for members. “Our job is to build the voice of our members. It is to go to government to say this is what our merchant members and our manufacturer members think are the key issues that affect their businesses.”
Among the issues that Newcomb said the BMF is highlighting with government are the changes, post-Grenfell, to the ways that manufacturers have to communicate about their products, Packaging Waste Regulations, and Inheritance Tax, and what he described as the “ridiculous decision” to get rid of Business Property Relief.
He continued: “People and skills is a key focus. Our biggest single investment has been into the Building Material Careers campaign,
PRESENT, FUTURE
BMF CEO John Newcomb set the agenda for the Conference with a look at how the issues of 30 years ago, are still very relevant.
which has seen over £400,00k invested so far and we will invest another £200,000 in it over the next 12 months. Skills and the ability to recruit new talented people into this industry will be the biggest single challenge this sector faces. We now have 336 designated campaign managers across the sector who will drive this campaign, we have 190 employer profiles on the website, and 2804 locations where there are actual jobs. We have heavily invested in social media and have 7million people who have seen the website and 17,000 who have gone onto the Building Materials Careers site and engaged with companies. So joining the campaign really does help to put our sector on the map.” At the last BMF Conference, in Istanbul in 2023, Newcomb said the BMF wanted to try and recruit 15,000 apprentices across the sector by 2030. “It seemed like an impossible task, but here we are, with 102 companies that have now pledged 15,638
apprentices between now and 2030. We have also developed over 50 apprenticeship programmes, that cover areas such as customer service, team leader, trade supplier, they aren’t just for young people. Every aspect of your business is covered by an apprenticeship programme that we offer”. Supply chain collaboration is another main push for the BMF, Newcomb said. “We are in an unusual situation in that we have a 50/50 split of suppliers and merchants at this event coming together and working together on how we tackle some of the issues. A great example is product data standardisation. About three years ago we launched the product data template. It’s very easy to use and is on our website and will have a relaunch in September.”
Allied to this is the launch, earlier this year of a new company, BMDS, joint owned by NMBS and BMF, with the objective to drive the product data exchange through this industry, via the Industry Data Pool. “Data is the new currency of the future,” Newcomb said, adding that it’s vital that everyone gets involved. “The future: one of the things that we have really learned over the last few years is that we can never stand still. There are four main areas that we are working on: What does the builders merchant branch look like over the next five or ten years? Steve Collinge of Insight Data is working on a detailed project to start to answer that questions, and the findings will be presented at Members Day in September.” Newcomb finished by announcing the dates of the annual BMF Members Day and Awards, to be held at the Hilton Metropole at the NEC in Birmingham, on September 17th and 18th. BMJ
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net July 2025
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