Staples Dumps a "Non-Green" Supplier
If anyone needed further proof that the invisible hand will be the most important force driving green and sustainable procurement initiatives, one need look no further than this story in Supply Chain Digest about how Staples is dumping a major vendor who supplied 9% of its total paper buy. The supplier, Asian Pulp & Paper, is allegedly "involved in illegal logging in Indonesia and China" and that its deforestation practices have endangered "tigers and other animals ... Office Depot and some European companies had previously ceased doing business with APP over these and other eco-concerns." One can almost imagine the boardroom discussion between Staples executives about not wanting to deal with protesters outside their stores when this decision was made. In my view, examples like this show that shame and fear is perhaps the best weapon on the sides of those who want to see companies make the best possible green and sustainable procurement decisions. After all, the free market -- and those which influence decisions with in it -- has many voices.
- Jason Busch
- Jason Busch
I am sure the market would make excellent decisions if the end user actually had the relevant information - such as country of origin, labels of approval from relevant organizations et al stamped on the product label. In this case it sounds more like traditional public perception management - or possibly plain-ol' political correctness on the executive board level.
Regardless of motive, it makes absolute sense to pro-actively track and audit your supplier base to avoid surprises leading to public embarrassment - or worse. In other words, good sourcing needs to focus more on calculating the cost of soft issues.
I see substantial awareness of the value of qualitative issues among sourcing professionals, but whether buyers are allowed to act on meeting soft targets is harder to say: quarterly budget goals are so focused on hard numbers...