Torque Magazine asked key industry associations for their views on the last 12 months, including the British and Irish Association of Fastener Distributors (BIAFD) and an international perspective on the home improvements/DIY sector from EDRA/GHIN. This time, we spoke we got the builders merchants perspective from the BMF...
Apprenticeships and skills training has been a cornerstone of the BMF (Builders Merchants Federation) focus in 2025, surpassing targets well ahead of time…
The BMF is the trade association for all businesses, merchants and suppliers, large and small, operating in the building materials' supply chain in the United Kingdom and Ireland. It exists to foster business friendly conditions for the sector and to help strengthen members businesses through essential services and support. It is the authoritative voice for the building materials sector, conveying the views and issues that matter most to merchants and suppliers, to policy makers and beyond. From the point of view of the building materials sector (Merchants and Suppliers/Manufacturers) as represented by the BMF, the year started full of hope with the new government promise to reinvigorate the housebuilding sector. With the year now drawing to a close, unfortunately to date this optimism has not been fulfilled and there has been little or no sign of any boom in the number of homes being built or even put into planning stages.
The BMF has continued to forge ahead with its crucial work in other areas to support its members with a special focus on improving skills and facilitating new entrants to the sector. Chief amongst these initiatives has been our Apprenticeship Pledge where we challenged the sector to embrace the use of Apprenticeships with a target of 15,000 new apprenticeships to be put in place by the sector by 2030. Remarkably, this target was surpassed nearly five years early such was the enthusiasm of BMF members.
The Apprenticeship Pledge is just part of a huge suite of training support provided by the BMF to its members and, earlier in 2025, we saw the official launch of our BMCareers programme. Aimed at informing job/career starters and career changers about the opportunities in the sector and then encouraging them to apply for the many roles on offer, the programme is centred around a new website (www.bmcareers.com) and a huge programme of targeted organic and paid for social media. Already, hundreds of BMF members have engaged with the programme, adding their own information to the website and sharing our social media posts, some have already found new staff recruits directly from the website.
With one of the key battlegrounds for future success of any business being in the area of the most efficient use of product data, the BMF has joined forces with the NMBS buying society to recently launch ‘Data Yard’. Much more than just a database, it serves as a collaborative hub that streamlines the sharing of consistent and up to date product information across the supply chain. This new initiative will drive overall industry efficiency and will be critical to merchants, buying groups and suppliers. If you want to find out more about the BMF, or to join the 1,000plus member businesses already benefiting from BMF support, go to www.bmf.org.uk
