As CEO of one of Europe’s largest hardwood importers the price of timber never ceases to amaze me. Today one can buy pack volumes of American, African or Asian hardwoods at pretty much the same price levels as twenty years ago. We could speculate for ever about the supply chain, however, the angle that most interests me is how can businesses such as Timbmet survive with hardly any price inflation, yet ever increasing costs?
The answer is largely through scale, efficiency and technology. The service we offer today is just astonishing in comparison with twenty years ago. We are a much bigger business yet a fraction of the number of people generates a superior service; mostly based on next day delivery, vastly superior working practices and, of course, state of the art data systems.
Today Timbmet is virtually able to offer a yet more efficient service - timber for sale on line. The only real restraint is our valued customers who actually don’t appear to be that interested in buying on the internet. I am sure that will soon change and I expect in a few years from now e-timber commerce will be the norm. For now though, with hardly any change in price, we carry on doing it the traditional way, but better.