Can I make a difference by choosing sustainable furniture - and how do I do it?

If you are thinking of buying a new piece of furniture, how do you know if it is more or less sustainable? Here we help you with what you can consider before choosing your next piece of furniture if you want to be more sustainable.

Look for recycled or surplus materials

It is often both better for the climate and the environment if you choose a piece of furniture made from either recycled or surplus materials rather than furniture that is made from new materials that are extracted in nature and which then cannot be used for wild nature with higher biodiversity. Furniture made from recycled or surplus materials typically has a lower CO2 emission and affects the environment and nature to a lesser extent.

Less CO2 is often used, as the raw material such as wood, metal or plastic does not have to be extracted from scratch, and sometimes it will also be possible to cut out part of the transport, as several links in the value chain can be cut out.

In Denmark, surplus materials or old end-of-life products are often burned off and end up as district heating or electricity in your socket. Converting furniture or other products into energy is usually the least sustainable solution, second only to depositing the products in a landfill.

Therefore, from a climate and environmental point of view, it often makes more sense to produce a piece of furniture from surplus wood or recycled wood instead of logging new wood. The same applies to other materials such as metal, stone, plastic, etc.

Swan-labelled furniture sets requirements for sustainable renewable raw materials, e.g. requirements for traceability and a minimum of 70% certified wood raw materials or limits for content and emissions of formaldehyde and volatile substances in chemicals and materials such as glue, filling materials, textiles etc. Read more here about furniture and sustainable recycled or surplus materials.

Used is better

If you buy a used piece of furniture, it is often more sustainable than buying a new piece of furniture, as it requires nothing more than transporting the piece of furniture to your home and possibly repairing, painting, reupholstering it, etc. If you collect your recycled furniture yourself in a car far away, and if the furniture requires a major repair by either you or the seller, then the furniture may end up being less sustainable.

It is sustainable that more people use the furniture, because then less furniture must be produced and thus less resources, energy and CO2 emissions must be used. Recycled furniture can often do something different than modern furniture. And then it is common sense to either please others yourself if you either sell or donate your used furniture.

Ideal has a 'take back' scheme, where the furniture owner can get up to 30% back for his used furniture, as the furniture is solid and designed to be repaired and sold again.

Choose furniture as a holder

It can be sustainable to buy good quality furniture, as they often last longer, and it pays to repair or sell on. It saves resources, reduces the amount of waste, and it can also be good for the private economy, as designer furniture often also has a higher resale value. Arne Jakobsen's Egg or the Swan is a good example of this.

Furniture that is certified with the Nordic Ecolabel or the EU Flower has been tested to be durable, safe and of good quality to ensure a long life. Furniture of good quality usually gives you greater joy in your everyday life, and designer and eco-labeled furniture will often be tested according to various standards, so you know they will last.

You naturally extend the life of your furniture if you maintain and treat it well. Wooden furniture or stone furniture may need to be oiled, soaped or varnished or waxed once. It may be a good idea to wash your textile furniture and check the furniture for joints that need to be tightened. Read more here about furniture maintenance.

Sustainable materials

When purchasing new or used furniture, look for durable and solid materials that can withstand years of wear and tear from you, your family, guests, children, pets, moving etc. and which can be easily repaired if the accident is over.

Wood: Solid wood can, for example, be sanded down and given a new surface treatment. A table top made of laminate, MDF or veneer cannot do this so easily. When you choose a wooden piece of furniture, you can check whether the wood is certified by, for example, FSC (Forest Stewardship Council).

Then you know that no more trees have been felled than the forest can reproduce, that animal and plant life is protected, and that the employees work under safe conditions. You can read more about certification of sustainable wood production here .

Wood absorbs CO2 while the wood lives in the forest and as long as the wood is not burned or left in nature to rot, the CO2 is trapped in your furniture. One cubic meter (1 meter * 1 meter * 1 meter) saves the climate 2 tons of CO2. And then wood is a renewable resource that does not leave waste or pollute and can be reused over and over again.

Plastic: Today, more than 90% of all plastic comes from crude oil, and plastic production makes up 6% of global oil production, corresponding to oil consumption in the global aviation sector.

Sustainable design, production and sale of furniture

There is much to gain from the sustainability account when designing and producing furniture. Check, for example, whether the furniture is designed to be easily disassembled and reused (circular design) and whether the materials consist of recycled or surplus materials. Also check whether production takes place, for example, with renewable energy such as solar cells or wine mills or whether they take back the furniture, minimize waste of materials, etc.

You can also investigate whether the furniture is produced on demand or for stock, whether the company throughout its value chain is socially responsible with proper working conditions such as collective agreement, working environment, support for the local community, etc.

Transport and furniture

The materials for a piece of furniture typically consist of wood, metal, fabric etc. The transport of the wood looks like this, for example: It is felled in the forest, cut up at a sawmill, produced at the joinery, delivered to the fire company's warehouse, and then the furniture is sent to the consumer or the store.

If it is recycled or surplus wood, the first two transport links can often be cut away, and thus you can also save a lot of CO2 if you use recycled or surplus materials.

When a product needs to be transported, it can be done, for example, by train, ship or barge, lorry, van or car, cargo bike, on foot, by plane etc. and the fuel or propellant can be, for example, diesel, petrol, biodiesel, biogas, electricity, e-fuels made on electricity, etc. The most sustainable fuel is usually made from renewable energy such as wind, solar, hydropower or biomass.

Transport of goods by ship and train often emits at least CO2 per kilometers per item. While truck transport and van transport, which do not run on renewable energy, emit more CO2 per kilometers per item.

All other things being equal, a product will emit more CO2 during transport, 1) the more kilometers the product itself or its semi-finished products are transported, 2) the more fossil energy used during transport, 3) how much space the product takes up (and weighs) ).

The least sustainable form of transport when transporting goods that are transported over very long distances with a lot of unnecessary air around them, carried on planes, vans or cars that use fossil fuels and where the cargo capacity is not used well enough.

Conversely, the most sustainable form of transport is the opposite: short transport of flat packed goods on renewable energy vehicles and where the freight capacity is sufficiently well utilised. Often the transport will be a mix of different forms of transport, and companies can actively do a lot to reduce their CO2 emissions, which originate from transport.

The first step is to measure how much CO2 either a product or the company emits in connection with transport. Ideal uses carriers who can account for CO2 emissions, who use renewable energy, and then we make sure that the item is packed as compactly as possible.

Sustainable packaging

Packaging is often seen as a culprit in terms of sustainability. Perhaps because the packaging is the first thing you encounter and often just have to throw the packaging away or for recycling. But packaging is often necessary so that you can safely and easily transport the furniture from one place to another without the furniture breaking.

It will often be the case that if just one piece of furniture out of many pieces of furniture breaks, it will require more energy and thus emission of CO2 to get a new product to you. It is therefore important that we use a sufficient quantity and quality of packaging so that the product does not break during transport. Conversely, we must also not use more packaging than is necessary for the furniture to be able to make the journey safely.

It can be slightly different how much the packaging actually burdens the climate and the environment. The Norwegian Institute of Technology informs that various calculations show that the packaging only makes up 1-5% of the environmental and climate burden in relation to the total product. Typically, the major burden from the manufacture of the product comes inside the packaging (70-80%).

The packaging (and transport) also becomes more sustainable if the furniture is produced so that it can be taken apart and packed without too much air around the furniture. It saves on the materials for the packaging, and more furniture can be transported during transport, which is also more sustainable.

Cardboard and paper can often be recycled by making it into new cardboard and paper, and in Denmark we have a good return system which ensures that it is easy to turn used into new. A large part of all paper and cardboard is recycled, thus limiting CO2 emissions etc. Ideal encourages all our customers to recycle their packaging.

It is more sustainable to reuse the packaging, so that it does not have to be converted into new packaging. It saves CO2. Ideal uses packaging as far as possible.