"Sustainable" gets thrown around the timber trade so often the word is wearing thin. Here's what it actually means at PitchPro — what we measure, what we don't, and where we've made trade-offs we're still not entirely happy with.
FSC certification, in practical terms.
The Forest Stewardship Council standard is the most rigorous third-party forestry certification operating in North America. It audits forest management plans, replant ratios, biodiversity protection, and the chain of custody from stand to invoice.
About 78% of our 2025 stock was FSC-certified at source. We're not at 100% because some of our reclaimed and small-holding suppliers can't economically afford the audit fee — and we'd rather buy from a careful Oregon woodlot than refuse the timber on paperwork grounds.
Where the trees come from.
We work directly with two cooperatives and one private forest holding spread across Oregon, Washington and northern Idaho. Every batch can be traced back to a stand, and the stand is named on the invoice. We replant at a 1.4:1 ratio across the partner forests — for every tree felled, 1.4 are seeded.
Provenance on the invoice is more useful than a logo on the website. If we can't tell you which forest a board came from, we shouldn't be selling it.
The honest trade-offs.
Tropical hardwood for marine decking — ipe, cumaru — is harder to source responsibly. We require FSC chain-of-custody certification on every import shipment and have refused two consignments in the last two years that didn't pass our review. That cost us money and clients. We think it was the right call.
Domestic pine and cedar give us more confidence: shorter chains, smaller forests, and inspectors we have personally walked the cut blocks with.
What we measure.
- Replant ratio per partner forest, audited annually.
- Distance from stand to mill (averaging 184 miles in 2025).
- Kiln efficiency — kWh per board foot dried.
- Off-cuts repurposed into kindling, pallet stock and biomass fuel.
What we don't measure (yet).
Soil carbon impact across our partner forests. The science is improving but we don't yet trust the data well enough to publish numbers. Watch this space — we'll write again when we do.