These minimum standards apply to any goods that Shelter Scotland and Shelter buy and encompass goods for resale (GFR) and goods not for resale (GNFR).
Shelter Scotland and Shelter acknowledge that our procurement decisions and the suppliers we work with carry social and environmental implications. We're committed to procuring goods and services in an ethical, fair and transparent way.
To procure ethically, we must set expectations and capture relevant information to make sure suppliers meet our ethical standards.
Any suppliers engaged to supply goods that contain the following materials are required to provide a response to the standards as stated below as part of an assessment of whether they are suitable to supply goods to Shelter Scotland and Shelter.
Before a supplier can be approved to supply to Shelter, we require:
a supplier response to the standards outlined below
completion of an online form confirming they meet the requirements set out in our code of conduct for suppliers
These goods standards and our code of conduct for suppliers together form Shelter Scotland and Shelter's ethical procurement framework in relation to the purchase of goods.
Paper (including cardboard)
In support of our environmental stance, we require that any paper goods we buy for our own use or as new goods for resale are sourced from well-managed forestry.
At a minimum, we require that all printed paper items (including cardboard) must be:
sourced from managed sustainable forestry
FSC® certified
widely recyclable after use
Cotton
In support of our stance regarding labour relations and our zero-tolerance approach to all instances of modern slavery (as detailed in our code of conduct), we will not support the cotton trade in countries or regions where these matters are known to be high risk.
We require suppliers to evidence the country of origin of cotton used in goods for resale, since we do not use goods made of cotton from the following countries or regions:
Turkmenistan
Uzbekistan
Xinjiang China
Suppliers need to provide details of 'fabric country of origin' for the goods they supply.
Use of plastics: recycled content and minimal packaging
We're working to reduce and where possible avoid the use of single-use plastic items along with goods containing microbeads, polystyrene, polyethylene, polypropylene, polyethylene terephthalate or polymethyl methacrylate.
We encourage suppliers to use materials with reused and recycled content, including recycled polyester. We support the use of goods that are designed with minimal packaging and can themselves be reused and recycled. Over time, we aim to exclusively buy recycled instead of virgin polyester.
Primary, secondary and tertiary packaging should be minimised and, wherever possible, made from materials that can be reused or recycled.
Suppliers should not use polystyrene within goods or associated packaging provided to us, as this can't be easily reused or recycled.
Product safety
The goods we buy for resale/as new goods must comply with all current relevant UK legislation and where applicable carry a UKCA or CE mark.
Hot water bottles: the hot water bottles we sell are compliant with BS1970:2012, the internationally recognised standard for the safety of rubber or PVC hot water bottles.
Inspection standards
In support of our stance regarding labour relations and our zero-tolerance approach to all instances of modern slavery (as detailed in our code of conduct), we need to make sure the factories manufacturing goods we buy are compliant with our supplier code of conduct and help us meet our commitment to procure goods in an ethical, fair and transparent way.
In order to verify compliance with our supplier code of conduct and these minimum standards, factories manufacturing the listed product areas must have been independently assessed to either SMETA Pillar 4 or Amfori BSCI audit. The audit certificate must be current at the time of supplier selection.
Product areas in scope of this standard:
electronics
garments
printed paper goods
textiles
gifts
The only exception to this are countries with an estimated modern slavery prevalence rate of less than 2.5 people per 1000 of their population in the Walk Free Global Slavery Index 2023 Dataset, Minderoo Foundation. In this case, the manufacturer should be certified with SEDEX.