STARK Group

STARK Group, Europe's leading distributor of heavy building materials, sought to understand how the sustainability transition in the construction sector would affect its business across seven European markets. The goal was to move beyond broad sustainability narratives and produce a commercially grounded market outlook: how fast is demand for documented and lower-impact building materials developing, which product categories and customer segments are affected, how do markets differ, and what does this mean for how STARK positions its assortment, tools, and customer proposition toward 2030.

We developed a comprehensive Sustainability Market Outlook covering regulatory analysis, market sizing, and commercial driver assessment across Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Germany, Austria, and the United Kingdom. The work combined deep regulatory analysis (EPBD, CPR, EU Taxonomy, national building codes, and certification schemes) with a proprietary market sizing framework that estimates how products shift from undocumented to documented to lower impact across markets and time horizons. We conducted country-level deep dives informed by STARK's local sustainability leads, benchmarked peers and adjacent industries, and translated findings into a commercial opportunity assessment including revenue exposure modelling, value creation mechanisms, and a prioritized recommendation set for business units. The final deliverable was a publication-ready report designed for both internal strategy use and external stakeholder communication.

The report provides STARK Group with an evidence-based view of where the market is heading, quantifying that the share of building materials sales linked to projects requiring environmental documentation is expected to grow from approximately 15% to 40% by 2030. It defines what future-fit means for building materials, maps the transition by country and segment, and identifies strategic priorities for capturing the commercial opportunity. The report has been adopted as a core strategic reference across STARK Group's business units and supports the company's positioning as the preferred partner for sustainable construction across its markets.

"We partnered with the team from The Footprint Firm to develop a Sustainability Market Outlook that goes beyond high-level narratives and provides clear operational insights. Their strong industry understanding, deep network across the construction sector and close connection to clients in our markets ensured that the analysis was grounded in commercial reality.

The team combined a strategic outlook with an analytical approach, translating complex regulatory and market developments into actionable implications. The consolidated view of key construction product–relevant drivers, including timing of key shifts, has been particularly valuable in enabling us to understand how and when to act.

We are pleased with the collaboration and outcome that we find both strategically robust and operational, and which will now serve as a key reference for guiding our priorities across markets."
- Louise Askær-Hune, Senior Director Group Sustainability & ESG at STARK Group