Updated Guide: What "Due Diligence" Actually Looks Like

A factory that quotes well and a factory that's actually compliant can look identical on paper. The difference only shows up after the goods have shipped — when it's too late to do much about it.

The Furniture Industry Research Association has published an updated guide, Sourcing Furniture Products in the Supply Chain, setting out what responsible sourcing looks like at every stage: agreeing a raw material specification, assessing a factory before you place business with it, controlling quality through production, and building batch traceability that means one bad shipment doesn't force a recall of everything you've ever ordered.

It also covers the part most businesses only think about after something's gone wrong: the technical file. If a customer, retailer or enforcement authority ever asks you to prove a product is compliant, this is what "yes, and here's the evidence" actually requires — and what happens if you can't produce it.

This edition has been updated to include the UK Flammability Regulations and EU GPSR, alongside the sourcing fundamentals.

What’s inside:

• Responsibilities across the supply chain — from producer to distributor
• Agreeing specifications and assessing factories before you commit
• Testing, quality control and batch traceability
• Building a technical file that holds up under scrutiny
• Plus, much more.

A must-read for anyone who specifies, buys or imports furniture, this is the difference between sourcing that looks fine and sourcing that gives you certainty, every time.

FIRA members can download Sourcing Furniture Products in the Supply Chain here.

Available for non-members for £125 from the FIRA Bookshop.