Potlatch Corporation Uses Forest2Market's Benchmark Service

Brent Stinnett, Vice President of Forest Resources for Potlatch Corp., is convinced he’d be in trouble without the services of Forest2Market (F2M).

Stinnett, who initially subscribed to F2M in 2000, said he has saved millions of dollars over the years with the help of F2M. That amounted to major savings for his former employer, one of the largest private landowners in the United States.

In his current position as Potlatch’s Vice President of Forest Resources, Brent sells about 4 million tons of product, including sawtimber and pulpwood, annually and expects to repeat the same results.

“When you sell that much in the open market, you have a lot of negotiations and bidding wars going on,” Stinnett said. “But when you sell such a large volume and are armed with F2M’s reliable data, it truly gives you leverage.

“If you are able to save 50 cents per ton on 4 million tons of product – that’s a savings of $2 million a year. And, that’s a conservative estimate.”

Indisputable, Third-Party Data
F2M data, which is supported by actual market transaction data, is hard to dispute. Stinnett said having the data makes previously hard-fought negotiations fly by with ease and helps him avoid confrontational relationships.

“F2M’s data is very easy to see and interpret. It’s broadly known and widely accepted as a standard for pricing the market,” he said. “People know that when F2M data comes out, they will have a heck of a time disputing it.”

Reliable Information
By using F2M, both buyers and sellers are able to use F2M neutral, third-party data to agree on a price. Stinnett said he has always been impressed with the quality of data F2M provides its customers.

“Its data is the most reliable I’ve seen,” he said. “It is very sanitized, and it’s transaction based, so there is validation in the form of a contract, which lets you know its pricing information is accurate.”

F2M strives to collect data from a balance of buyers and sellers. Data is collected discreetly and disseminated anonymously in real time. Data collection includes attributes that are important to pricing, such as tract accessibility, logging conditions, tree quality, type of harvest, sale terms, and rainfall and weather patterns.

“It does a good job at screening the data it is given and often challenges data that is unusual,” Stinnett said. “No one else in this business takes the time to do that. I think F2M is the best entity in terms of collecting and analyzing unbiased data.”