Paul Pennick, Procurement Director for the h&b Buying Group, tells Supplying Timber magazine how his love of timber has shaped his career, and how buying groups can help independent timber merchants grow in a competitive market.
Buying groups are a familiar sight in the construction industry, with many independent timber and builders’ merchants becoming members to take advantage of their combined purchasing power to access more competitive prices, exclusive deals and promotions.
The h&b Buying Group was founded in 1997 and now has more than 110 members and still growing. All members can make the most of the preferential terms and purchasing agreements available, as well as a wide range of additional benefits and opportunities to share best practice and innovation.
Paul Pennick, Procurement Director for h&b Buying Group.
Paul Pennick joined h&b Buying Group one year ago as the latest step in a long career in timber merchanting, during which he has worked for MKM Building Supplies as Head of Forest Products; Counter Supervisor & Timber & Landscaping Business Development Manager at JT Dove; Branch Manager at Robert Duncan Timber, and various roles early in his career with both Harcros and Jewson.
“I started at Harcros back in the mid-1990s as a management trainee, in the cement shed and compound. This is where I got a good foundation in what a heavyside builders’ merchant was all about,” Paul says. “Then I spent some time working in the timber shed and started understanding more about the different types and uses of timber, and really started to get an affinity with the material. That’s where my love of timber started.”
Paul was swiftly promoted within the Joinery Dept, being given regional responsibilities and, at the young age of 19, acted as Interim Branch Manager. This, Paul says, was a steep learning curve.
Nurturing people and helping them develop
After several years spent working within the merchant sector, he moved out of the industry for a time, even working as a singer and entertainer, but his love of timber ultimately drew him back to the industry and he joined MKM Building Supplies where he would spend the next 18 years – seven in branch and 11 in the central team working his way up to Head of Forest Products.
“I had an affinity with timber, and I never really lost that,” he explains. “While I was at MKM I got Chain of Custody certification awarded throughout the group, and helped navigate the business safely through COVID. And I’m proud to have been able to support many of the category and product managers there. I’m very much a nurturing person and I believe in helping people to develop.
“You can always bring someone new in, but if there is someone in the business who really wants to grow, you’ve got to give them the tools to do that if you want to retain the best people.”
That desire to help people develop – and to help the timber industry grow as a whole – led Paul to become the Builders’ Merchants Federation’s (BMF) Sector Chairman for Timber. He has also represented the TDUK on several subcommittee groups.
Paul’s passion for developing people comes from the many people who have inspired him in both his personal and working life. Whether directly or indirectly, Paul says he has worked with many inspirational people in his career who, whether they know it or not, have helped guide his career aspirations.
He says: “I want to be an advocate for timber and for the merchant sector, because it feels like a selection of suppliers want to cut the merchant out of the supply chain completely. E-commerce has taken a slice of the pie, but not every timber merchant, importer or manufacturer can go direct to the customer.
“There’s a place for merchants to grow in the industry if they can sell efficiently, responsibly and safely; that’s where I feel the buying groups and the trade federations come in – to give merchants the opportunity to do that and provide them with best practice and upskilling solutions.”
Accelerating a sustainable future
Now that Paul is Procurement Director at h&b, he is using his experience to promote timber and to help h&b’s merchants and suppliers maximise the opportunities that timber can bring.
“Our strategy from a timber perspective is very aligned with TDUK’s – do the basics well, buy better, lead best practice, and accelerate a sustainable future. It’s quite concise in its simplicity,” he says.
“Within that is a lot of work creating a futureproof supply chain and facilitating communication between the supply chain and our members. Accelerating a sustainable future is essentially about the people and the planet, but it’s also helping facilitate profitability, because if you’re not profitable, you won’t be around very long.
“Ultimately, it’s all about nurturing development. Timber is a product that takes a long time to grow – it’s got to be nurtured and developed, and you’ve got to add value to get the most profit out of the product at the time it’s harvested, for everyone’s benefit.
He continues: “At h&b we have created a Key Influencer group of timber-orientated people from the membership whom I can use as a sounding board for advice and to ensure that the strategies we are setting are aligned with their businesses. They can also help us influence best practices.”
Helping merchants buy better
While h&b is one of several buying groups, the business has a slightly different structure to most, as it has two distinct business arms. The buying group itself is a not-for-profit LLP, and there is a separate profit-making commercial projects division, which is run as a limited company and helps to drive what Paul describes as the ‘selling together’ concept.
“We’ve also changed from the committee-led buying concept that we once were and have invested in a central, professional procurement team. This helps members invest more time within their own businesses. And, with our support, they can grow their businesses and efficiently navigate challenging periods.”
There are different membership levels within h&b: the development group is for merchants with turnovers between £1-5 million then, once they’ve hit that figure and met other criteria, they can become an affiliate member, before eventually becoming a full member.
“Having that eclectic mix of membership means you need to service different expectations at different levels, but at every step we can help advise our members on taking the gradual steps needed to make the right choices,” Paul adds.
“We can be their advocate as well as do the research to help them get the right things in place, whether that’s in timber purchasing, timber sales development, sustainability, or around leading best practice. When you have assembled a supply chain that aligns with your strategy and you have secured a commercial advantage you can really progress with a mutually beneficial partnership that not only adds value to our members but also backs up the supply chain.
“However, it’s not just about providing product at commercially competitive prices. Yes, we will do the basics well and buy better, but we will also help our members with business support and sustainability initiatives as well. Our industry experience and our network of affiliations with organisations like TDUK gives us the awareness and understanding that we can pass to our members.”
* This article was originally published in the November/December 2024 issue of Supplying Timber magazine.
