Sustainability at VS: The Circular Economy in Practice

The cantilever office chair JUMPER Air Active by VS in blue

Sustainability at VS What Does It Look Like in Practice?

A look at VS manufacturing using the example of the JUMPER Air Active school chair shows what is important for sustainable manufacturing and why the circular economy is nothing new for VS.

As a fourth-generation family company, sustainability is already in VS’s company DNA. But the order of magnitude of VS manufacturing as the European market leader brings with it particular responsibility for dealing with resources. For decades, VS has been taking this seriously as an obligation, long before sustainable actions became a source of pride for companies.

In 2022, VS manufactured more than a million chairs and a good half a million tables. What is the key to sustainability in the face of manufacturing that is so intensive in terms of materials and energy. The durability of the product. VS has been more-or-less unbeaten in this since its founding in 1898 because VS school furniture is often used for 30 years or more. This is even more remarkable because everyday use at school is the hardest stress test for any type of furniture.

Sustainability Starts with Design

To ensure this durability and, at the same time, sustainability, decisive factors must be taken into account even before a chair like the JUMPER Air Active leaves production for the first time. Because sustainability starts with design. According to estimates of the European Parliament, more than 80 percent of the environmental impacts of a product are determined during the design phase. In the development of every piece of furniture, VS therefore puts the focus on recycling-friendly, modular construction that is extremely robust and simple to repair. This is exactly what a sustainable product lifecycle should look like: reliable products that can continue to be used for as long as possible, refurbished, repaired, or recycled. This is how the useful life of a product can be extended and waste is reduced to a minimum. This protects increasingly scarce resources.

Sketchy 3D animation of the student chair JUMPER from VS

VS has drawn up a lifecycle analysis for most products so that customers can consciously opt for sustainable products. The Environmental Product Information, EPI for short, details the phase-specific environmental impacts of the product concerned - from the proportion of recycled material to the amount of CO2 emitted during manufacture.

Sustainably Good – The Circular Economy using the Example of JUMPER Air Active

The best example of sustainable manufacture at VC is the JUMPER Air Active. It was the first school and institutional chair to be awarded the silver “Cradle to Cradle” certificate in 2019. Not much more is possible in terms of sustainability. With little effort it can be easily dismantled into its few components which are all recyclable and can be returned to the materials cycle. What is true for the JUMPER is true for all VS furniture:

Screwed is better than glued. This means that wearing parts can be replaced more easily and separated accurately at the end-of-life.
The simpler the design, the better: The fewer “accessories” an item of furniture has, the fewer small parts can break off, the fewer spare parts have to be ordered and stocked. Manufacture is leaner and more energy efficient.
Using the right materials: The plastic used in the JUMPER Air models or steel is extremely resistant and largely reusable. In principle, metals can easily and theoretically infinitely do the rounds of the materials cycle. It’s a different matter for plastic: The material ages due to UV light, cleaning products, etc. It could only be returned to the same materials cycle with extremely high energy and cost expenditure. That’s why the sustainable solution here is “downcycling”: reuse for products whose looks and functionality, as well as whose manufacturing process, are much less dependent on material quality.

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Producing zero waste
Due to the contoured shape of the seat shell, approximately 50% of material waste is produced. This is directly ground into granules and fully reused for additional seat shells.
Sustainable management
The floor glides are wear parts, but they are used for various VS chair models. This sustainable multiple-use simplifies inventory management (around 270,000 pieces were needed in 2022), reduces transportation distances, and minimizes processing efforts.
Closing the loop
The frame made of steel tubing (containing about 40% recycled metal) is scrapped after use and thus fed into a well-established circular system. Part of the JUMPER may then continue its life as a cooking pot or once again as a school chair.
Modular design
In addition to environmentally friendly materials, a recycling-friendly design is crucial. The JUMPER can be easily disassembled into its few components, and the individual materials can be recycled in a pure form.
Energy-efficient recycling
Old JUMPER Air shells are ground into granules and reused, for example, for beverage crates (downcycling). Reprocessing them into new seat shells, which is energy-intensive, would worsen the environmental footprint, increasing rather than reducing the carbon footprint.

Sustainable Production – Even More is Possible at VS

For years, VS has been working on keeping the environmental impact at the Tauberbischofsheim manufacturing site as low as possible and being able to offer its customers products that have been manufactured as sustainably as possible. Here are some of the main elements that make up a firm foundation for sustainable manufacture:

VS generates electricity in the company’s own block heat and power plant, uses regenerative energies and produces low CO2 heat from burning the woodchips resulting from processing during manufacture. In addition, district heating pipelines have been installed so that the energy can also be used in other manufacturing halls.

In addition to environmentally friendly design for very long-lasting products, VS offers a spare parts service to increase the useful life with the customer. Old furniture is taken back, dismantled, and screened on our own recycling yard and the materials obtained are fed back into the materials cycle via certified partner companies.

Transport routes are deliberately kept short. VS therefore works with suppliers in Germany and neighbouring countries. To save on packaging waste, we largely do without packaging materials when transporting furniture. The focus is more on transport protection. The material that is used here is reusable, for example furniture blankets.

Schematic site plan of the VS Möbel facilities in Tauberbischofsheim

Lived Sustainability at VS

Instead of only using new plastic, VS is turning to processing pre-consumer recyclates – depending on availability on the market.

Instead of only using new plastic, VS is turning to processing pre-consumer recyclates – depending on availability on the market. Unlike post-consumer recyclates, which are obtained from household waste and products sent for recycling, pre-consumer recyclates are industrial plastic waste. These are reprocessed for further use and then have a comparable quality to new plastic. By gradually switching to the material of the future, VS can go a little way to counteracting the millions of tonnes of plastic waste.

Black and white photo from a factory hall of VS in which two employees are taking a table top out of a Lignodur press.

And now a last look behind the scenes: whereas VS is working on expanding sustainability, the Lignodur press has been working in the manufacturing hall for more than seventy years. Here, using a patent from the 1950s, to this very day beechwood chips that occur as waste during production are pressed into tabletops. They are unbreakable, but above all they are a visible example that sustainability has had a permanent place in VS manufacture for decades.

Sustainability at VS: The Circular Economy in Practice

Sustainability at VS: The Circular Economy in Practice

Sustainability at VS What Does It Look Like in Practice?

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