Join
Build a better understanding of where and how books are made. The Book Chain Project is open for book and journal publishers, commercial printers, and manufacturers involved in the book supply chain.
For book and journal publishers
Production, safety, technical and ethical teams use the Book Chain Project’s tools to understand and manage risks in their supply chain. We analyse and distil complex data helping you to make informed buying decisions.
Our three tools can be used independently or as a single system; you choose the most relevant parts for your business.
The project fees, shown below, are based on an annual work plan beginning on 1st September and ending on 31st August. Fees are adjusted pro rata each quarter from 1st September if you arrive part-way through the year. A discount is available when involved with all three tools.
| Forest Sourcing* | Chemicals & Materials | Labour & Environment | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Access to the web application | |||
| Attendance at regular working group meetings | |||
| Attendance at annual seminars | |||
| Project fees ex. VAT (Sep 23 – Aug 24) | £8,155 | £7,070 | £5,865 |
| £1,000 discount when using all three tools ex. VAT | £20,090 | ||
* A reduced-access version of the Forest Sourcing tool is available for an ‘entry level’ fee (50% of Forest Sourcing fee), which gives you access to basic data and annual seminars. It does not include attendance at in-depth working group meetings and, if using all three tools, the discounted fees do not apply.
For print suppliers
As a print supplier you can access all three tools in the Book Chain Project. You will be asked by your customers at the publisher to provide information for the Labour & Environment, and Chemicals & Materials tools. There is no fee for these. There is a small fee to use the Forest Sourcing tool.
| Forest Sourcing* | Chemicals & Materials | Labour & Environment | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Access to the web application | |||
| Project fees ex. VAT (Sep 24 – Aug 25) | £666 | – | – |
For manufacturers of paper, board, and other book components
As a paper manufacturer there is no fee for using the Book Chain Project.
You have a dedicated space for your paper and board brands, which you can use it to maintain your product listings, their technical specifications, and their pulp and forest sources. Your products will be searchable by all the publishers and printers involved with the Book Chain Project.
Publishers add paper and board brands to the system and we ask you to update the pulp and forest sources every 12 months. This includes the tree species used, their country of origin, and any third-party certification. Use this system to answer multiple customer requests in a single portal.
Your data is used by SLR Consulting to risk assess a paper brand’s forest sources. We then issue each paper brand with a ‘grade’ on a rating system of stars. This grade is visible to publishers and print suppliers involved with the Book Chain Project.
The pulp and forest source data you supply is held securely in a password-protected database. Information on your suppliers, including their third-party certification numbers, is only visible to administrators from SLR Consulting. We use it to verify that certificates are valid and relevant to the correct product type and tree species. All supplier information is hidden from all other users.