Wooden Signs vs Plastic: What Counts as Procurement Evidence for Green Key, Green Tourism and GSTC

An engraved wooden sign counts towards a hospitality sustainability audit only if you can evidence three things: what the material is certified as, what the product and its packaging contain, and who holds the certificate. This guide sets out the Green Key, Green Tourism and GSTC criteria that purchasing is scored against, states exactly what our products are and are not, and lists what to put in the file. Nothing here is a general "eco-friendly" claim — every line is checkable.

What the schemes ask for

The three schemes a UK hotel, guest house or restaurant is most likely to be working towards all score purchasing, and all three have moved towards asking for evidence rather than intent.

Scheme	Where purchasing is assessed	What the criterion says
Green Key 2026–2031 (in force from 1 October 2026 to 31 December 2031)	Chapter 6, Procurement — one of seven chapters, replacing the thirteen in the 2022–2025 criteria	An imperative requirement that the establishment implements and follows a Sustainable Procurement Policy guiding the selection of goods, services and suppliers. Chapter 2 (Guest Awareness and Involvement) separately requires that all sustainability communication — printed, spoken or digital — is accurate and does not exaggerate claims.
Green Key 2022–2025 (the criteria existing certificate holders were last audited against until they recertify)	Chapter 6, Waste, criterion 6.18 (guideline)	At least five purchased products are either not packaged in plastic or packaged in plastic with recycled content. The explanatory notes to these criteria list FSC alongside the EU Ecolabel, Nordic Swan and Blue Angel as recognised eco-labels.
GSTC Industry Criteria (hotels)	Section D, criterion D1.1, Environmentally preferable purchasing	"Purchasing policies favour environmentally sustainable suppliers and products, including capital goods, food, beverages, building materials and consumables." Criterion D1.2 adds that consumable and disposable purchasing is managed "in order to minimize waste."
Green Tourism	Sustainable procurement is one of the scored areas	Green Tourism's assessment awards credit for sustainable procurement practice; the assessor sets the evidence format, so ask yours before you file.

Two things follow. First, a purchase only helps if you can say precisely what it is — "wooden" is not a criterion, "FSC-certified" is. Second, over-claiming now costs more than under-claiming: Green Key's 2026–2031 criteria make accurate communication a condition of certification, and in the UK the Competition and Markets Authority has been able to fine businesses directly for misleading environmental claims since April 2025 under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024. The Green Claims Code is the test: specific, substantiated, and nothing hidden.

What our materials are — and are not

Material	Certification	What you can state in an audit file
Oak veneered MDF, 4mm — most signs, door hangers, keyrings and name badges	FSC-certified	"FSC-certified oak veneered MDF." Cherry Grove Craft is not itself an FSC certificate holder — the certificate sits with the material supplier — so our products do not carry the FSC logo and we do not publish a certificate number for this material. The claim is about the material, and it is a text claim.
Moso bamboo — bamboo signs, door hangers, keyrings, coasters and name badges	FSC Chain of Custody, certificate BV-COC-190523	"FSC-certified Moso bamboo (certificate BV-COC-190523)." The number can be checked on the public FSC certificate database. Again, the certificate is the supplier's; see how to verify an FSC certificate.
Solid oak, 20mm — QR, WiFi and hearing loop blocks	Not FSC-certified	"Solid oak." No certification claim.
Birch plywood — some bookmarks and small items	Not FSC-certified	"Birch plywood." No certification claim.
Natural slate — slate coasters	None	"Natural slate." No certification claim.

MDF is a composite — wood fibre bonded with resin — and our guide to whether MDF is sustainable gives the full picture rather than the flattering half. For how the three main materials compare in use, see bamboo vs oak vs plywood.

Plastic content, product by product

Every product page carries a Plastic content line in its specification. This is the summary.

Product	Plastic content
Hanging signs	None — wood and jute twine only
Freestanding and table signs	None — sign and wooden base only
A4 and A5 panels, with or without stand	None — wood only; no adhesive pads are supplied
Circular door signs	None — wood only; fixed with your own adhesive pads
Door hangers	None — wood only
Keyrings	None — wood and a metal split ring
Name badges with magnetic fastening	None — wood and a metal magnet
Name badges with pin or pin-and-clip fastening	Contain plastic in the fastening — no plastic-free claim is made for these
WiFi and specials boards	Oak frame or face with a wipeable whiteboard or blackboard surface — not a plastic-free product
Solid oak blocks	None — wood only
Packaging, every order	None — card envelope or corrugated box, paper tape, paper void fill

What to put in the audit file

1. The order invoice — product names and quantities. Every product title names the material.
2. The product page specification — save or print the Specifications section, which states the material claim and the Plastic content line for that exact product.
3. For bamboo products, the certificate number — BV-COC-190523 — with a note that it is the supplier's Chain of Custody certificate and a screenshot of the FSC database entry.
4. The criterion the purchase supports — for Green Key, procurement-policy evidence under Chapter 6 and, for packaging, the plastic-free line; for GSTC, D1.1 environmentally preferable purchasing. Attach the sentence from this guide rather than paraphrasing it.
5. What not to write — "100% plastic-free" (not true of pin badges or WiFi boards), "carbon neutral" or "net zero" (we make no such claim), or the FSC logo (licensed to certificate holders only).

Wood against plastic, without the marketing

Acrylic and PVC signage is durable, cheap and better than wood outdoors; it is also petroleum-derived, rarely recycled in practice, and usually printed, so the graphic is a laminate or ink that scuffs. An engraved oak veneer or bamboo sign is FSC-certified fibre, carries no ink or laminate because the design is cut into the surface, and arrives without plastic packaging. It is an indoor product — oak veneered MDF marks in damp — and it is a composite, not solid timber. Those are the trade-offs; a procurement file that states them is stronger than one that does not.

Bulk discounts apply automatically at checkout per product, from 20 units of the same product. All items are made to order. Dispatch time is shown at checkout. UK orders via Royal Mail Tracked 24. International via Royal Mail International Tracked.

Frequently asked questions

Does an FSC-certified product count as eco-labelled for Green Key?
FSC is listed among the recognised eco-labels in Green Key's explanatory notes, alongside the EU Ecolabel, Nordic Swan and Blue Angel. Whether a particular purchase is counted is the auditor's decision, which is why the file should state the material precisely rather than describe it as sustainable.

Can I put the FSC logo on my own menus or sustainability page because I bought FSC-certified signs?
No. Use of the FSC trademarks needs a licence from FSC; neither you nor we hold one for these products. State the fact in text — "signage in FSC-certified oak veneered MDF" — and keep the supplier evidence on file.

Are your name badges plastic-free?
Badges with a magnetic fastening are wood and metal only. Badges with a pin or pin-and-clip fastening contain plastic in the fastening, so we make no plastic-free claim for them.

What changed in the Green Key criteria on 1 October 2026?
The thirteen chapters of the 2022–2025 criteria became seven: Sustainable Management, Guest Awareness and Involvement, Water, Energy and Carbon, Waste, Procurement and Living Environment. Procurement is now a chapter of its own with an imperative Sustainable Procurement Policy requirement, and accurate sustainability communication is itself a criterion.

Is Cherry Grove Craft an FSC certificate holder?
No. The certificates sit with our material suppliers. That is why the oak veneered MDF claim is a text claim with no certificate number, and why the bamboo certificate number (BV-COC-190523) is our supplier's Chain of Custody certificate, not ours.

Also see: all FSC-certified products, hotel and hospitality supplies, hotel and hospitality signs, accessibility signs, wooden name badges, our materials and sustainability hub, and what signage a hotel needs, room by room.

Sources: Green Key criteria and explanatory notes 2026–2031 (hotels and hostels) and 2022–2025, Green Key International; GSTC Industry Criteria with suggested performance indicators for hotels, Global Sustainable Tourism Council; Green Claims Code, Competition and Markets Authority; Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024.