In 2013 the SWPA took a major marketing step with the launch of www.byggaute.nu, our first interactive consumer-targeted website, which provides guidance and information on exterior timber building projects, with the ultimate focus, of course, being treated timber.
The name translates as ‘building outside now’, and ‘now’ is the operative word, as we limit the site’s active operational period from April to August, peak season for Nordic DIYers to take on garden decking and other exterior construction projects. This enables suppliers to gear up to a targeted period of demand generated online. And it was a hit, recording 25,000 unique visitors in the five months. Sweden is a small country, so that’s no mean achievement!
The site has switched on again this year, but with updated looks and more internet marketing tools. We’ve set up Facebook and Instagram links, use Adwords, Adthis and Tynt, and are also sponsoring Facebook newsfeed adverts. And these developments seem to be having the desired traffic-driving effect. We opened for business the second week of April and recorded 3,000 visitors for the month. We’ve now devoted all marketing resources into the site.
As an added visitor attraction, users can post pictures of their project, and enter a best design competition.
We also have guest bloggers on the site, and not just from Sweden. Recently we had an article by Janet Sycamore of the UK Timber Decking and Cladding Association (TDCA), with which we have a close relationship. She highlighted the importance of good design and installation practices in any project and the critical importance of not compromising on quality.
The SWPA and TDCA are both, of course, highly quality focused and the similarities between the Nordic Wood Preservation Council NTR quality assurance scheme, to which the SWPA is affiliated along with sister bodies in Denmark, Norway and Finland, and the UK DeckMark are striking. The core of both is that timber must be correctly treated for specific end use, and class specification must be respected and applied. Both recognise that poor practice will result in decay – and bad publicity for timber.
Both also stress the importance of correct construction. Unlike DeckMark, the NTR scheme does not lay down installation rules. But we promote best practices through marketing and in association with the sawmill association Swedish Wood. And the two schemes are aligning further, with third-party production control, a long time feature of the NTR system, now set to become part of DeckMark too.
Our quality and production control across the European wood preservation sector will come under closer scrutiny as key elements in meeting latest standards to control and minimise environmental impacts, giving us even greater incentive for best practice and experience sharing. In the framework of the EU Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) we all have to implement and abide by new guidance on Best Available Techniques (BAT) for the prevention of pollution of water, air and soil. Vital pre-conditions for this are effective factory production control and systematic maintenance processes. We are now under way with this harmonising work at national, Nordic and European levels, but the schedule is tight.
While this effort is ongoing, the SWPA can report the successful conclusion of another project confirming the environmental commitment of our sector and benefits of our products. This comprised a major life cycle analysis (LCA) of Nordic treated pine by IVL, the Swedish Environmental Research Institute, alongside Siberian larch, central European robinia and equivalent plastic products. To make a like-for-like comparison, one product – equestrian fencing – was assessed for all four materials. The conclusions confirmed expectations. The NTR Class A-treated product, corresponding to Use Class 4, came out best when considered as a functional unit, resulting in least impact on climate change. Robinia came next, with larch and plastics producing similar figures as the highest impact choices. The major adverse factor for Siberian larch was transport distance, underlining that local sourcing, as well as the treatment processes, is set to become an increasingly key environmental specification criteria.
These results, we hope, should further enhance the appeal of NTR-treated timber, of which 1.25 million m³ was produced last year in Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway, with 50% exported.
