timbernews
A magazine for SCA’s solid wood products customers | www.scatimber.com
STRONG GROWTH FOR SWEDISH
BUILDERS’ MERCHANTS
PROJECT SALES
IN FRANCE
– partnership at its best
SCA TIMBER SUPPLY UK
INVESTORS IN PEOPLE
4
2015
FROM TIMBER
M
Photo: Sébastien Laval
oving from sawing logs to being a
reliable supplier of consumer products for retailers is a big step.
And it’s a step that SCA Timber has
boldly taken. Having started out as a sawn
timber supplier, we first focused on understanding the needs and requirements of the
wood processing industry, so that we could
become an efficient supplier of components,
blanks and other inputs for the industry,
with a view to making the supply chain
from raw material to finished product as
resource-efficient as possible.
WE THEN BEGAN to develop our third pillar
– becoming a supplier to the builders’ merchant sector. To succeed in this, we needed
to develop new skills. We needed to be good
at distribution and stock management, to
understand the customer’s needs and to
offer complete solutions and product
ranges. We needed, not least, to become
proficient purchasers of solid-wood products, in order to supplement the customer
offering with products that others are able
to manufacture more efficiently than we
are. And there are more things we need to
learn too. We need to understand our customers’ customers, consumers, professional
builders and keen DIY enthusiasts. We need
David Soulas, Works Director, Entreprise
Merlot SAS in France.
3
Strong growth in builders’
merchant sector
4
A planing mill at the
cutting edge
5
Prescribers: an example
of a successful partnership
6
“Our colours are our values”
8
SCA Timber Supply UK
accredited with Investors
In People
9
TIPS launched in Melton
11
Movers and shakers
11
Global oversupply putting
pressure on prices
11
Wood – the natural choice
at Expo 201512
TimberNews SCA Forest Products AB
SE-851 88 Sundsvall, tel +46 60 19 30 00
www.scatimber.com
Timber News is published four times a year
Editor-in-chief Björn Lyngfelt
Production KarMin kommunikation
Repro & printing Åtta.45 Tryckeri AB, Sundsvall
Subscribe to Timber News, please
contact ingrid.lofqvist@sca.com
Feel free to quote us, but please
name us as your source.
Photo: Per-Anders Sjöquist
CONTENTS
Experienced contractor
brings new expertise
to consumer product
to understand what attracts these consumers, how they want to have the products presented, why they choose one item over
another, and how we can tempt them to
choose wood more often.
SCA TIMBER SUPPLY now has a presence
in four markets, with production and processing in seven locations across three countries. Our products for the builders’ merchant sector make up around a third of SCA
Timber’s overall sales.
We benefit from having a number of
demanding, development-driven and challenging customers, who have tested our
capacity to meet the requirements of this
market. We have had to really stretch ourselves. We have occasionally stumbled
along the way, but we have picked ourselves up, tried again, and learned a great
deal in the process.
Now we are working to develop what we
have built up. In France, we are trying to
find new channels and partners as a means
of selling finished wood products with high
added value for major construction projects. In the UK, we are fine-tuning our
newly built planing mill and focusing on
staff development – we recently obtained
Investor in People certification. In Sweden
we are increasing the proportion of finished
products, tailor-made for the builders’ merchant sector and we have improved our skill
base by employing one of Sweden’s most
experienced planing contractors.
We do recognise, however, that we are
barely at the start of our journey. We need to
improve our product development, our distribution, our understanding of solid-wood
product consumers and our ability to support our customers in their marketing. We
aim to make solid-wood products our customers’ most profitable product range and
to convince everyone considering a construction project that they should choose wood.
Anders Ek
President SCA Timber Supply
SCA TIMBER is one of Europe’s leading manufacturers of wood-based products,
with an annual production of 2.1 million cubic metres. The product range is
supplemented with service and distribution solutions for customers in the wood
industry and builders’ merchant sector.
SCA Timber is part of SCA’s Forest Products business unit, which produces
publication papers for newspapers, magazines and catalogues, as well as
paper for packaging, solid wood products, pulp and renewable energy.
SCA Forest Products also manages SCA’s extensive forest holding and supplies
SCA’s Swedish industries with wood raw materials, in addition to offering
cost-efficient transport solutions to SCA’s units.
timbernews | 2
Photo: Per-Anders Sjöquist
EXPERIENCED CONTRACTOR
BRINGS NEW EXPERTISE
Jan Frycklund has spent many years working as a successful contractor specialising in wood processing. Now he has
taken a new step and become a key resource within SCA
Timber Supply, where he will be examining development
opportunities for wood processing in Sweden and abroad.
A
s a contractor and businessman, Jan Frycklund has a
longstanding relationship with SCA and is highly familiar with SCA’s products. When he was offered the option of
coming on board as an SCA employee, it was therefore hard
to say no.
“I’m excited to be joining SCA, which shows amazing commitment, is incredibly knowledgeable about wood and is a
respected player in the wood industry,” comments Jan.
INVESTMENT in further processing will be Jan Frycklund’s
main area of work at SCA. He has excellent experience in
building advanced production lines and he knows his wood.
He believes that a higher degree of automation creates
better production, which provides an opportunity for
increased profitability. An initial step will be to consider a
potential investment in the Tunadal planing mill, with a focus
on creating the right tools to drive the business forward.
“I can’t wait to help develop SCA, particularly in the
area of further processing, which is my field of expertise,”
says Jan.
HIS TASK is to use his knowledge and experience of being
bold and innovative to get the best out of the large volume of
raw material to which SCA has access – choosing segments,
developing new products and making them profitable.
3 | timbernews
“I’ve learned the importance of making the products
you invest in really good, having high ambitions when
it comes to quality and keeping your promises to customers,” asserts Jan Frycklund.
He feels that the demands placed on quality and
packaging are rising, but the need for information is
also growing. If the idea is to focus on products with
greater added value, which in the end tend to be aimed
at the consumer, it is also imperative to communicate
the benefits and function of the product. This also helps
the retailer to successfully sell to their customers.
“If you don’t get that right, you’re missing a key
point in your customer relations,” explains Jan Frycklund.
HIS DIARY already contains two planned visits to other
planing mills and an introduction to SCA’s other operations.
“I’m so pleased to be working in an area that I have
experience in and where I feel I can make a difference,”
he says.
Mats Wigardt
Footnote:
Jan Frycklund was formerly CEO of Norrlands Trä, a company
that works with wood of high added value – pre-treated wood
flooring and cladding. Under Jan Frycklund’s leadership, the
world-class company has become a much in-demand supplier
and a market leader in its segment.
Jan Frycklund, a new
and vital resource
within SCA Timber
Supply.
Photo: Matthias Tunger, Matton
These are happy days for Swedish builders’ merchants.
Strong growth in builders’ merchant sector
Sales at Swedish builders’ merchants continue to show strong growth at a
record double-digit rate, according to Ulf S. Gustafsson of the Association of
Swedish Building Materials and Hardware Merchants.
“The sawmills are listening more to the wishes of the end customers,” he
suggests.
T
he summer of 2015 can be summed up as mainly cool and rainy, which prompted
people to consider home improvements, and
that increased sales at builders’ merchants.
June alone saw a 16 percent increase in
sales. Over the whole year, the growth figure
is estimated to be 10 percent, despite strong
results in the previous year. The
volume of solid-wood products is
thought to be up 14 percent.
“These are fantastic
figures that we rarely
or never see in the retail sector as a whole,”
says Ulf S. Gustafsson, who heads the Association of Swedish Building Materials and
Hardware Merchants.
THIS SALES GROWTH makes Sweden one of
the strongest markets for builders’ merchants
in Europe. No other country can boast the
same rate of growth. In addition to a summer
that encouraged people to take on DIY projects, Ulf S. Gustafsson also quotes the slow
housing market, the interest rate situation,
higher gross wages and the announced
changes to the RMI programme of tax
relief on refurbishment work as reasons for the intensified pace of
household renovation work.
“Just in September, the Swedish Tax Agency’s tax relief payments under the RMI scheme
went up over 20 percent, to a total of SEK
12.7 billion for the first nine months of the
year,” reports Ulf S. Gustafsson.
Solid-wood products account for
around a third of the industry’s sales. Ulf
cites the fact that the sawmills are now
offering more value-added products and
have thus come closer to the wishes of
the end customers as another reason for
the strong volume growth that the segment has enjoyed.
And there is agreement from Magnus
Agervald, CEO of builders’ merchant
Byggmax, which has over 100 stores in the
Nordic region, of which 68 are in Sweden.
The company’s sales were 18 percent
higher for the third quarter of 2015 than
for the same period in the previous year.
“GREATER DEMAND for products with more
content is something of a long-term trend,”
says Magnus Agervald. “One example is factory primed and painted exterior cladding,
which is becoming increasingly popular.”
For SCA Timber Supply Skandinavien,
the strong growth in the builders’ merchant sector has put the company’s plants
under considerable pressure. A busy order
book has left the delivery chain stretched,
with shortages in certain ranges.
“With such a major increase, it’s hard to
avoid consequences at the consumer end,”
explains Joakim Nehrer, newly appointed
Sales Manager for the Swedish market at
SCA Timber Supply Skandinavien.
timbernews | 4
A planing mill at the cutting edge
Photo: Mats Wigardt
Overall, however, he feels that SCA has
done a good job, keeping up the pace at its
own plants and focusing on fulfilling promised deliveries to large and priority customers. The ever-increasing demand for primed
and painted cladding has also led to significant investments.
“We’re looking to take greater responsibility for the end customer,” says Joakim
Nehrer. “We can see a place for product
development and alternatives to painting
boards by hand, and naturally we want this
to be part of our product portfolio.”
INCREASING PROXIMITY to the retail stage does,
Photo: Mats Wigardt
however, mean never losing sight of the customer’s viewpoint. According to Joakim
Nehrer, good forecasts and flexibility in production will make it easier to adjust the kind of
value being added at short notice, for example.
But, he says, SCA also has to be better
at producing example calculations and
in-store material promoting the benefits of
the company’s products, to make it easier
for retailers to do their job. And at showing
how to fit and finish the products too.
The growth curve looks good, according to Joakim
Nehrer, Sales Manager Sweden at SCA Timber
Supply Skandinavien.
“It’s really not OK to expect the customer
to work out how the product should be
used,” stresses Joakim. “Training and customer care are important and they’re areas
that we need to explore more thoroughly.”
THE KEY NOW is to strengthen and boost the
product range. And to analyse the market to
see whether there are other products or
product areas that may be worth developing.
“The growth curve looks good,” summarises Joakim Nehrer. “Now it’s up to us to
continue building on the positive development we’ve seen in 2015.”
Mats Wigardt
Footnote:
The RMI (ROT in Swedish) programme is a stimulus for the
construction industry in Sweden in the form of tax relief.
5 | timbernews
A significant proportion of the solid-wood products for exterior use that are supplied to Scandinavian
builders’ merchants come from SCA’s planing mill in Tunadal. The mill’s manager is Daniel Wiklander.
Tunadal planing mill is part of SCA Timber Supply, making it an independent
unit, separate from the sawmill of the same name. The range comprises
value-added products with strong margins, including 25,000 cubic metres of
primed exterior cladding.
SCA’S PLANING MILL in Tunadal forms a
key component of SCA Timber Supply Skandinavien’s strategy. It provides a significant
proportion of the solid-wood products for
exterior use that are supplied to Scandinavian
builders’ merchants.
Over the past year, the orders have been
flooding in. A forecast sales volume of
132,000 cubic metres has instead become
just over 150,000 cubic metres.
“To meet this demand, we need raw
material and the capacity to machine and
paint, plus highly committed customer service and distribution teams,” says the planing mill’s manager Daniel Wiklander. “It’s
also vital that we can give customers
straight and honest answers, even if the
news is sometimes not entirely positive.”
But having Sweden’s largest spruce sawmill within walking distance naturally
makes it easier to smooth out the bottlenecks
that can quickly arise when demand rockets.
“That is an incredible advantage,” admits
Daniel Wiklander.
A new paint shop came on stream at Tunadal in September 2015. Now fully operational, it produces around 25,000 cubic
metres of green-split, close-grained and
industrially surface-treated exterior cladding, avoiding the detour via the paint shop
in Stugun.
Tunadal now has its own cost-effective
paint shop, with logistics that ensure customers receive what they want, when they want it.
Customers are offered a high-quality service,
with guaranteed deliveries of an agreed range
within 48 hours from receipt of order to customers across Sweden, stretching from Boden
in the north to Ängelholm in the south.
“We keep 130 products in stock, so
they’re always available,” explains Daniel
Wiklander.
PRODUCTION of Tunadal’s key exterior clad-
ding is now steered by length, with four
options: 3, 4.2, 4.8 and 5.4 metres.
A much requested change that has produced happier customers, according to
Daniel Wiklander, who would like to see the
offering made even more tailored.
“But all changes takes time,” he says.
They have to be mulled over for a while
before they finally take hold.”
And if you want to be a cutting-edge supplier of value-added solid-wood products,
you also have to be prepared to make new
investments. In the case of Tunadal planing
mill, this might mean expanding the paint
shop to handle two coats instead of the one
coat that’s applied today.
DANIEL WIKLANDER also believes the plan-
ing line needs upgrading to make it more
cost-effective, with a capacity that better
corresponds to market demand. This
would require significant investment, but
it would build out yet another bottleneck
in production.
“There’s no denying the excitement of
working with the strong tailwind we have at
the moment,” he says. “But without skilled
and committed employees, we wouldn’t be
where we are today.”
Mats Wigardt
Footnote:
SCA Timber Supply Skandinavien has plants in
Stugun and Tunadal, giving it a total machining
capacity of 170,000 cubic metres. The core products are structural timber, strength-graded timber,
exterior cladding and pressure-treated timber.
Prescribers: AN EXAMPLE OF A
In collaboration with SCA Timber France, Merlot suggested stained Douglas fir cladding to the architect. The photo shows part of the facade. (SCAU architect)
To continue its development, reach new markets and publicise its know-how,
SCA Timber France is rolling out a strategy among prescribers. These prescribers may be all stakeholders involved at the pre-project stage of a construction project, from the architect to the construction company, the contractor or
decorators. A perfect illustration of this strategy, which is starting to bear fruit,
is the Résidence Provence project in Poitiers and the partnership with Merlot
SAS, the French company in charge of construction.
T
o begin with, there is a long-standing link between the manufacturer, SCA
Timber France, and Merlot. The company
was commissioned to renovate this building, which was built in the 1960s and
which has not had any refurbishment since.
It involved renovating 128 apartments and
building 40 new ones, as well as adding
two new floors to the three-storey building.
Merlot worked on the design of the structure with Eiffage at the pre-project stage,
then, when working on the finishing
touches, the company was able to offer
SCA Timber France products. “For this
project, we turned to SCA Timber France
for the wooden cladding for the facade. In
collaboration with SCA Timber France, we
suggested stained Douglas fir cladding to
the architect. What the architect liked
about our approach was that he was able
to personalise what we suggested and
choose from a range of available shades. In
fact, the staining that was used wasn’t what
was initially recommended, so we laid a
little over 4000 m2 of special products. We
most often work with SCA Timber France
this way: for finished products for external
use, cladding or decking,” David Soulas,
Works Director at Merlot, tells us.
THE WHOLE PRESCRIBING approach thus
made sense on this project. The company,
Philippe Bence, Marketing and Development
Director, SCA Timber France.
timbernews | 6
SUCCESSFUL PARTNERSHIP
an increasingly squeezed construction market, this is an essential
quality. “Nowadays everything has
to be done as soon as possible and
we’re expected to be super-reactive. So when we approach a supplier like SCA Timber France, we
expect them to be too. For example, for the Résidence Provence, we
were missing some timber at the
end of the project, so we absolutely
could not wait a month for it to be
delivered. SCA Timber France was
up to the task and delivered the
next day,” says David Soulas.
THIS IS ALSO based on trust, as
Cladding detail. (SCAU architect)
Merlot is accountable to the client,
a housing association in this case,
as much for the smooth running of
the works as for the end result.
Philippe Bence, Marketing and
Development Director at SCA
Timber France says that “our contacts with prescribers and contractors are intended to promote our knowhow and our technical solutions to consolidate our position in large markets.”
HOWEVER, no prescribers process could
We trust SCA Timber
France to be flexible and
to find solutions.”
Balcony detail. (SCAU architect)
in close cooperation with SCA Timber
France – “we see our main suppliers,
including SCA Timber France, very regularly,” says David Soulas – can make special requests because it is intimately familiar with the manufacturer’s know-how
and capabilities. In the case of Résidence
Provence, this involved guiding the architect towards a more resistant, customstained material. The various stakeholders
in the project appreciated SCA Timber
France’s adaptability.
MAINTAINING a good business relationship
also leads to enhanced responsiveness. In
7 | timbernews
succeed if the quality of the products were
not up to scratch. David Soulas confirms
this view. “We’ve relied on SCA Timber
France for a long time because of the quality of their products, their responsiveness,
and because they know how to adapt, to
be flexible and to find solutions, as that’s
what people expect from us too. People
come to us to find solutions for their projects, which can sometimes be vague. It’s
then up to us to find manufacturers that
can offer and make the right products. If
someone’s going to keep saying “no” all
the time, then it’s going to be impossible.”
Any prescribers process is therefore underpinned by the satisfaction of customers,
who can therefore publicise SCA Timber
France’s technical solutions.
A positive image, close customer relationships, know-how, quality products and
a permanent on-site presence are certainly
the keys to the success of SCA Timber
France’s approach.
Jérôme Kaufman
Photo: Sébastien Lav
David Soulas, Works Director, Merlot SAS.
“OUR COLOURS ARE OUR VALUES”
SCA Timber France has now adopted the colours of the Swedish SCA
Group. Though the company has had an aesthetically pleasing
facelift, there’s more to it than that: the spirit of the global group has
also rubbed off on the French subsidiary, as Sales Director, Jeremy
Roussarie, and Marketing and Development Director, Philippe Bence,
tell us.
T
he story continues. After SCA’s
acquisition of PLF and the
merger of the two companies in
2012, the last step was to clarify
SCA Timber France’s image by
moving away from PLF and gradually adopting SCA’s colours and
graphic charter. The idea is to
rethink the approach to marketing
by building on the group’s values in
a marketplace populated by increasingly large and consolidated play-
ers: “we had to make a choice and
show the timber market in France
that SCA wanted to be a national
player,” Jeremy Roussarie tells us.
THIS INITIATIVE, which he has led,
is intended to be much more than
just a clarification of the company’s
visual identity. Going forward, SCA
Timber France will have a reorganised sales force: one team for distribution and another for manufactur-
ing. This is a major change that enables the company to challenge the
big names, to make things clearer
for staff and thus to improve how
effective the company is for customers. Know-how is preserved and
enhanced to serve all stakeholders
nationally.
The other big news about SCA’s
rebrand is the forthcoming launch
of a new and completely redesigned
SCA Timber France website. “It’s
something our partners (distributors, users, designers, etc.) expect,”
Philippe Bence tells us. From the
architect producing a design to the
construction company, everyone
needs to be able to get product
information any time, wherever
they are. The site will thus offer
more institutional information,
timbernews | 8
technical information, specific new
tools such as a sampling service, a
photo library of our products in use,
and files that can be digitally incorporated into design software and
digital mock-ups, etc. “These tools
will make it easier for consultants
to design their projects,” continues
Philippe Bence.
LASTLY, there are SCA Timber
France’s values: to be an innovative
European leader that adapts its
products to customers’ needs and to
new markets; to be a responsible
company and to foster sustainable
development through its forests,
which help to improve the environment; and lastly, to be an effective
company that listens to customers’
and consultants’ concerns.
Jérôme Kaufman
Photo: Sébastien Laval
Jeremy Roussarie, Sales Director, SCA Timber France.
SCA Timber Supply UK accredited
with Investors In People
Photo: Amy Sellers
SCA Timber Supply UK is celebrating their Investors In People accreditation at the first attempt. A fantastic achievement demonstrating
the commitment SCA invests to the
development of its people across
the business. However, the journey
the business faced to gain the
accolade has been one of complete
change.
L
ynsey Pace, HR Manager, who
joined SCA in July 2013 at
the beginning of a huge period of
change, recalls “I do not believe
anyone anticipated the scale of
change the Company were about to
embark on.”
At the time, SCA had two distribution centres in Stoke, a manufacturing facility in Welshpool and were
about to open a further manufacturing operation in Melton, Humberside.
SCA UK had successfully gained two
of the largest potential customers
within the UK’s building merchant
and home improvement markets.
9 | timbernews
The SCA Timber Supply team in UK celebrates the Investor in People accreditation.
The Investors in People accreditation certificate is a signal that change has
happened.
This resulted in a reengineering of
its Stoke Distribution Solutions
operation whilst opening a new
Timber Production Services operation in Melton, Humberside.
The SCA UK operation had
tripled in size overnight and in
November 2013, the Company
appointed John Griffiths as
Managing Director who comments: “Major change requires
strong leadership together with
clear and unambiguous communication and objectives.”
Each business stream was
tasked to focus on key performance indicators (KPI’s) specifically around health and
safety, ‘on time in full’ (OTIF),
costs, volume and profitability.
Weekly meetings were established to monitor performance.
They concentrated on solutions and made effective decisions on commercial and operational problems together. Colleagues across the business were
asked to make contributions to
improve H&S, service levels and
profitability.
change across the two existing
sites and the new site in Melton.
Alongside the KPI meetings and
Period Reviews, our management team made a conscious
effort to be visible across all
sites and speak to staff and
supervisors. We listened to their
problems and acted upon them.”
Issuing monthly updates,
meeting with staff in engagement groups and recognising
individual’s effort all contributed to improving communication and morale. Recruitment
and training processes were
tighter and fairer, and the
reward strategy was based on
the employment market and
contribution, not by how long
someone had worked for the
Company. Staff and management began contributing to the
direction of the business and
talking openly and honestly in
meetings. It was evident that
there was now a good sense of
camaraderie amongst teams and
people believed in SCA’s purpose.
WITH A combined manufactur-
TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT
had previously been intermittent and on occasions not relevant or measured. The Company focused on leadership
behaviours using the global
”
ing capability of 140,000m³ and
15,000m³ of timber treatment
facilities, SCA Timber Supply UK
supplies a range of timber and
associated products to both UK
home improvement retailers and
the builders merchant sector. The
workforce supporting this operation comprises of a niche set of
skills in machinery, timber knowledge and commercial fami-liarity.
Headcount was increasing each
month to reach the budgeted total
for year end 2014 and by January
2015, 236 staff were employed
across three sites in roles such
as timber merchandisers, key
account managers, supply chain
controllers, finance, marketing
and business development.
John says “Communication
played a huge role in driving the
SCA Leadership Platform. All
senior and first line management went through the Onboarding module, which explored their own leadership
styles against what the company expects and gave them a
basis to work on. This was followed up with the launch of
the Company’s appraisal system
Global Performance System
(GPS):
“The Leadership Platform
and GPS system that SCA has
designed is fantastic. The focus
is on behaviours – there is no
point achieving every objective set if the way in which the
person acts isn’t aligned to our
core values of respect, responsibility and excellence” Lynsey
says.
This year, the Company made
a decision to assess it’s improvements against the Investors in
People framework. During September 2015, the
business was assessed against 39
evidence based requirements
under headings such as Business
Strategy, Management Effectiveness, Involvement and Continuous Improvement. The assessment involved an impartial evaluator visiting the sites and
speaking to staff members confidentially as well as reviewing our
existing process and practices.
“It is very easy to believe in
your own PR and think that the
job you are doing for the Company and for people, is right.
This assessment allowed us to
objectively analyse exactly what
our employees thought about
our business and what they
knew about its’ direction” say
John Griffiths.
SCA TIMBER SUPPLY UK met
the requirements of the Investors in People Standard and con-
It is very easy to
believe in your own PR
and think that the job
you are doing for the
Company and for
people, is right.”
sistent evidence was also identified for six of the criteria above
this standard, specifically mentioning our core values, KPI’s,
top managers as role models
and people being committed
to the success of the business.
The assessor remarked that
people within the organisation
had a good understanding of the
Company’s plans for the future
and were very clear about
their goals and objectives in
their own roles. It also noted
that people reported a real sense
of teamwork in the business and
a genuine willingness amongst
people to support each other
and help each other out.
“One of the nicest and honest
remarks from the assessor was
that the management style of
John was perceived by all people
interviewed as exemplary and
inspirational. This is how we
expect all of our management
team to behave and when this is
led at the top, it makes things
much easier to implement” Lynsey
says.
THE INVESTORS in People accre-
ditation certificate sits proudly
in the reception areas of all UK
sites. It is a signal that change
has happened. It wasn’t an easy
journey but the people within
SCA Timber Supply UK pulled
together to achieve what they
had set out to accomplish. Alongside the Investors in
People report, the Company are
now focusing on the constructive feedback to further improve
its business.
Efforts are now concentrated
on creating a learning environment for all, including first line
managers, as the report highlighted that there is a fine balance
between operational priorities
and management getting the best
from their people. Following this
report and the results from SCA
group’s All Employee Survey
(AES) 2015, the management
team will focus their priorities
to ensure the people within
SCA Timber Supply are listened
to and supported.
Amy Sellers
John Griffiths, Managing Director,
SCA Timber Supply UK.
timbernews | 10
Timber Innovation
Performance Systems
launched in Melton
THE IDEA behind TIPS is to focus
WITH A site machining capacity
the business by carefully breaking
down goals into key success factors
ensuring employees understand
what their purpose is. The result:
improved efficiency and safety of
the operation. TIPS allows for
performance evaluation against
the goals and to act on issues that
need to be resolved quickly.
increasing to 90,000m3 over three
shifts in 2016, Melton’s other success factor is to keep its promise to
its customers. TIPS helped achieve
this throughout 2015 by ensuring
shop floor staff focus their attention
on the quality of finished product
and the manufacturing capabilities
of the machinery. Employees concentrate on the output each shift
produces by achieving run speeds
and reducing lost time. This drives
‘on time in full’ (OTIF) service levels
to ensure its customers get what
they want when they want it.
“Everyone has been complimentary about TIPS because it has
helped bring an improved team
spirit to resolve issues together”,
Phil concludes.
SCA’S
TIMBER
PRODUCTION
Services business stream based in
Melton, UK, implemented the initiative this year. Phil Lockwood, General Manager says: “TIPS have given
us all the opportunity to get involved
in continuous improvement; it
has helped our site immensely by
empowering each team to identify
their own actions to solve issues that
arise each day”.
Since Phil’s appointment in January 2015, the site has gone from
strength to strength. Phil credits his
team for this and highlights the
importance of safety: “By implementing TIPS we’ve reinforced the
message to keep each other safe – in
a 400,000 square foot factory with
an increasing number of employees,
and fast paced machinery it is imperative that safety is my priority”.
PHIL LOCKWOOD, General Manager
at the Melton site.
MOVERS AND SHAKERS
JAN FRYCKLUND has been appointed Operations
Manager at SCA Timber Supply and did take up his
new position on 7 October 2015.
Jan, who has extensive experience in advanced
wood processing, will be working on developing SCA
Timber’s broad processing operation, both technically
and in terms of the offering for customers.
Jan’s previous position was CEO and co-owner of
Norrlands Trä.
Patrick Fournier, Managing Director at SCA Timber
France, has left his post at his own request on 2 November 2015.
BENJAMIN BODET, Site Manager at SCA Timber
France’s operations in Rochefort, will take up the post
of acting Managing Director as of 2 November until a
permanent solution has been reached.
Photo: Paul Bradbury, Matton
Following the successful implementation of (TIPS) Timber Innovation
Performance Systems at SCA’s Sawmills in Sweden, the UK has been
keen to follow their lead.
Global oversupply putting
pressure on prices
Although wood consumption is forecast to grow
more than production this year, global oversupply is
likely to remain an issue. We thus do not expect any
general economic improvement in the immediate
future.
RISING WOOD CONSUMPTION primarily in the USA, but
also in Europe, does however suggest that the market
situation will improve over a slightly longer time horizon. A strong domestic market in Sweden has also made
a positive contribution over the year.
THE DECLINING ECONOMY in China, the situation in
Egypt and poorer purchasing power for the oil-exporting countries have had a negative impact on the market
balance over the summer and the autumn, with stockpiling as a consequence at the Nordic sawmills.
This primarily affects the lower grades of pine, where
the aforementioned markets usually account for much
of the export volumes from Sweden.
THE CURRENT ASSESSMENT is that the oversupply will
remain in place for some time to come. We will see a continued pressure on prices, chiefly in the lower grades, in
late 2015 and early 2016.
Anders Ante Andersson
Marketing Director, SCA Timber
11 | timbernews
Wood – the natural choice
at Expo 2015
Poland’s pavilion.
By the time the World’s Fair 2015 closed its doors in Milan
at the end of October, wood had played a lead role in a large
number of the 54 pavilions.
O
ver six months, from May to October, around 20 million
people visited the huge site just outside Milan that hosted
Expo 2015.
The theme for this year’s World Fair was “Feeding the Planet –
Energy for Life”, with many examples of future solutions for the
planet’s food and energy supplies.
A prime example was the Austrian pavilion, which comprised a
whole forest that generates and creates fresh air, complemented with
a thick dossier of facts and statistics on the importance of the forest
for the global environment.
Another example was the US contribution, which shows
how ordinary high-rises can be provided with vertical gardens
for cabbages, lettuces or tomatoes, placed on moving panels.
France’s fantastic pavilion at
this year’s World Fair in Milan.
IT WAS ALSO INTERESTING to see the wide use of wood in the
design of the 54 pavilions. This is perhaps not so surprising
considering the theme of the exhibition – building in wood goes
hand in hand with sustainability and reducing the environmental impact.
As the host nation, Italy set the tone right at the entrance.
The 8,000 square metre Zero pavilion – named after the UN’s
Zero Hunger Challenge – was covered in spruce cladding and built
with wood sourced directly from the sawmill.
China’s pavilion – called Land of Hope – was a development of
traditional Chinese architecture, with a design in steel and glulam,
plus an almost floating ceiling made from bamboo panels.
THE JAPANESE PAVILION also turned to ancient construction tech-
niques and presented an extremely earthquake-proof structure with
no metal parts – 20,000 pieces of glulam lock each other into place
and are easy to assemble and take apart.
China’s pavilion,
Land of Hope.
Malaysia’s pavilion.
Perhaps most advanced was the French pavilion, which took the form
of a giant pergola with a ceiling packed with examples of the country’s culinary culture. The glulam beams in larch and spruce produced
a strong but light structure.
According to architects Anouk Legendre and Nicolas Desmazières,
wood was a natural choice in view of this year’s theme. Then there is
the fact that it is more sustainable and at the same time more attractive than other options.
Mats Wigardt
timbernews | 12