A Tigerwood deck highlights how wood decking is beautiful, versatile, & eco-friendly.

These days, being green and using eco-friendly products is more than a trend. Our whole economy is starting to recognize and value materials and items that have been manufactured and/or promote a healthy, green, and eco-savvy lifestyle. Even the recent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has shown us that there can be a heavy price to pay when we rely too much on environmentally problematic and damaging resources and materials.

What does this have to do with wood decking?

Well, there is a huge marketing push led by composite decking companies to cast all wood decking as non-eco-friendly. These companies want you to believe that all wood decking comes from illegal logging and that it decimates the world’s forests. Here’s the truth, as an FSC certified lumber supplier, the wood decking that we sell here at Advantage comes from eco-friendly forestry practices.

Here are 5 things you need to know about Green Decking:

1. Species like Tigerwood, Garapa, Cumaru, and Ipe are renewable resources. With the growing number of managed forests and with the LACEY Act in place, you can find many green decking options that come from sustainable forestry methods.
2. Composite decking is not as eco-friendly, or as dependable as advertised. In fact, because it originates from oil-based plastics and can’t be recycled, you can disqualify plastic decking from the list of eco-friendly products.
3. FSC wood decking is available and can help you gain LEED certification credits. However, FSC certified decking shouldn’t be the be-all-end-all of green decking options. Just because FSC decking is more expensive, doesn’t mean that you’ll get superior boards. So, be careful about buying certified FSC wood just based on the label. Make sure you get Premium/Clear grade material. When you buy decking from Advantage, you will be purchasing decking material that comes from the same areas and are harvested using the exact same FSC standards.
4. Not all green decking is expensive. Unfortunately, many eco-friendly wood products jack up their prices just because they put the green label on their products. Let’s be clear, Tigerwood decking and other hardwood species were just as green and 100% free of chemical additives years ago. These days, we’re just paying attention and valuing the inherent qualities that make these wood decking products “green.”
5. When you strip away all the hype you’ll find that wood decking, especially the exotic hardwoods, are eco-friendly from a purely practical perspective. They last for decades, don’t require chemicals to resist decay and insects, are a renewable resource, don’t emit gasses or contain toxins (like formaldehyde or dioxin), were harvested using sustainable forestry methods, and will not have to be replaced. When you’re long gone from your home, you can also rest assured that the decking is 100% biodegradable.

These benefits mean that you can buy and build a green deck with confidence knowing that your purchase is an environmentally sound one that won’t negatively impact the environment.

If you have questions, or find this information of interest, share it with your network, and leave us a comment below. We’d love to hear from you.

FSC Certified Wood is available.

One of the nice things about being the leading importer of exotic hardwoods is that we are able to adequately provide wood that is FSC certified to the marketplace.

Our high standing with the most reputable mills in Brazil means that we provide the best FSC wood at very competitive prices.

With our Chain of Custody FSC Certification, Advantage is in a unique position to monitor and track the process. From start to finish, when you order FSC Cumaru, Garapa, Tigerwood, or any other exotic hardwood, you can rest assured that you’ll receive the best quality FSC material.

If you’re looking to accumulate MRc7 and MRc5 LEED points, we’ll also provide our FSC certificate for faster processing through the USGBC.

Contact us today to get a custom quote on certified FSC lumber:

Removing a Wolf Tree from a Forest is eco-friendly and promotes growth. The removal of these trees helps define Sustainable Forestry.

There are a lot of bad actors in the lumber industry. However, to lump in every lumber company as a villain of the Earth is both unsubstantiated and very misinformed.

Case in point, we recently received a letter from someone who insisted that we were not an eco-friendly lumber company. This person was concerned about a picture they saw of a felled tree on one of our marketing pieces. Our response was not to ignore this person.  Below is the response that our CEO sent that dealt directly with this person’s concerns.

“Our industry, like any other, does have some bad players. But let me explain why my company is taking the lead in being a part of the solution, not the problem.   I understand your concerns but let me assure you that the tree in question was selected by a Forest Engineer because it no longer produced seed, such a tree is known as a wolf tree. A wolf tree is a tree that literally dominates its immediate surroundings and, because of its advanced age, can no longer reproduce seeds.  Contrary to ill-informed and, sadly, popular assumptions, a tree of this status is, in fact, not healthy to a forest. These excessively large trees starves smaller trees of light.  You will see in future publications of our newsletters how these trees decay from the inside out and become hollow.  This is a perfect tree to cut as it is dying from the inside out but is caught at the right time to still yield a lot of usable lumber.

Moreover, a full 30 year management plan was instituted for the patch of land and certified by the Brazilian government agency IBAMA. This agency ensures only trees that are removed are a benefit to the forest. They allow only a few trees per acre to be cut. They also develop plans to allow the improvement of less abundant struggling species which are sun starved under the canopy of wolf trees.  It is one of the best sustainable forest plans that I have seen. They are so meticulous in their planning that they even plan the direction the tree will fall when cut so as to minimize damage to smaller trees and to minimize extraction damage.  Replanting of various species in other areas in a 5 to 1 ratio is also implemented.

Proper forest management improves the life and value of a forest when done correctly.   I would be happy to speak to you about any doubts you have on our forest management practices, as it is something we take great pride in.   Many steps are taken to ensure a positive effect on the forest; for instance unlike any other operation only 10 trees are skidded on any path out of the forest.  This ensures quick regrowth on the logging path of new trees and undergrowth. Unlike other operations do not take these measures, our skidding paths are nearly impossible to see after 3 to 6 months.   The methods that we employ cost a substantial amount to implement and are anything but profit driven.   The felling of these wolf trees improves the future of the forest, improves the diversity of the forest by allowing younger trees of various species to grow that where struggling around it, and provides the native people in a struggling area with food, as well as many other benefits.

These kinds of sustainable forestry projects is being used by the Brazilian government as a example to other forest management sites and to implement new standards.”

Recently the Brazilian government has highlighted that these methods have led to a significant drop in deforestation. In fact, sustainable forestry has led to the Biggest Drop in Deforestation in 20 years.

With these facts in mind, it’s important that people realize that companies like Advantage Trim & Lumber and organizations like the Forest Stewardship Council are working closely to ensure the health and long term sustainability of the rain forest.

With a full inventory of FSC wood available, Advantage Trim & Lumber will continue to lead the way as one of the world’s leading suppliers of eco-friendly wood.