In April, Print Buyers Online.com asked our major print buyer members, "How often do you request FSC or SFI certified papers for your print projects?" While the majority (51%) of the respondents said they request certified papers under 20% of the time, I find it interesting that 11% of print buyers said they request FSC or SFI certified papers over 80% of the time, and only 21% said they don't purchase FSC or SFI certified papers. These numbers have increased significantly since we asked the question just one year ago. Here is a complete breakdown of the print buyers' survey responses:

51% -- "Under 20% of the time"
11% -- "20-39% of the time"
1% -- "40-59% of the time"
5% -- "60-79% of the time"
11% -- "Over 80% of the time"
21% -- "We don't purchase FSC or SFI certified papers"

More than 70 major print buyers participated in this survey. Respondents shared the following comments with us:

"We are just getting started. The percentage should grow as we educate more of our supervisors."

"We have been fortunate enough to have several of the papers we have been purchasing for years becoming FSC certified. In one case, we changed the paper spec in order to make an FSC choice. We will continue to make these choices in the future, whenever possible."

"We are currently trying to print 100% of our marketing material FSC Certified. I have told many of our current vendors that it is important for them to become FSC Certified if they want to continue to bid on our work. We currently bid out over $750K worth of printing a year."

When we asked the same question to our print supplier members, 6% of print suppliers said their customers request FSC or SFI certified papers "over 80% of the time." Only 3% of printers did not offer FSC or SFI certified papers.

It is clear more and more companies are moving towards using sustainable resources for both internal and external communications. What are your thoughts on this trend and how is it affecting your company?