Community

Our Mission

To create value for our customers through sustainable design, range depth, reliability and price. We want our customers to experience excellent hassle free service

Our Vision

To be the UK’s leading furniture manufacturer offering well designed and well made products at highly competitive prices

Our Core Values

We Love design
We bring the latest international trends to market

Quality at Heart
We are passionate about quality. Diligence and dedication are key

Customer Fixated
We learn with our customers and collaborate to meet their needs

Tighten your belt
We offer a wide portfolio of well-designed, upholstery products at prices many people can enjoy

Honesty & Integrity
We are straight talking and take a no nonsense approach to dealing with issues

The Buoyant Team
Each and every team member is vital to our success

The Plan is the Plan
We deliver what we promise!

Our on-going charitable work is hugely important to us. We recognise our responsibility to contribute to local and national charitable organisations, with the aim to promote happiness and provide true support in many different worthy cases.

We pride ourselves in supporting the following charities:

Macmillan Cancer Support:

Macmillan is one of the largest British charities, providing specialist health care, important information and financial support to people affected by cancer.

Arafest:

Arafest runs two of its own events annually. These include a vibrant summer festival and festive Christmas ball. They’re committed on providing support to under privileged children and young people living in the area of Hull and the East Riding of Yorkshire by administrating grants to charities and other helpful organisations. The chosen charities that Arafest support are Freedom Road Creative Arts, The Hull Beats Bus, Special Stars charity, Beverly Cherry Tree, The Scrap Store, The Herd Theatre as well as the Jane Tomlinson 10 kilometre run.

Visit website

Pendleside Hospice:

Pendleside hospice “exists to promote and enhance quality of life for people with life-limiting illnesses”.

We are an employer required by law to carry out Gender Pay Reporting under the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017.

This involves carrying out six calculations that show the difference between the average earnings of men and women in our organisation.

Using a data source of 5th April 2022 the results are as follows:-

Difference in hourly rate

• Women’s mean hourly rate is 11.77% lower than men’s
• Women’s median hourly rate is 3.71% lower than men’s

Proportion of women in each pay quartile

• Top quartile (highest paid) 20.1% of the top quartile are women
• Upper middle quartile 26.1% of the upper middle quartile are women
• Lower middle quartile 28.3% of the lower middle quartile are women
• Lower quartile (lowest paid) 28.1%

Who received bonus pay

• 1.41% of women
• 1.67% of men

Difference in bonus pay

• Women’s mean bonus pay is 89.67% lower than men’s
• Women’s median bonus pay is 77.94% lower than men’s

Buoyant Upholstery Ltd supports the objectives of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 of eliminating slavery and human trafficking to operate in an ethical manner. This statement is therefore made by Helium Sofa Group Ltd and subsidiary Buoyant Upholstery Ltd that are required to make such a statement in Accordance with the Modern Slavery Act 2015.We recognise our responsibility and we are committed to respecting and protecting the human rights of all those who work within our operations including but not limited to employees to all levels, directors, officers, agency workers, agents, contractors, suppliers and customers.

We are devoted to running our business responsibly and to maintain high ethical principles, to support transparency and honesty, to work with others to protect the rights of workers. Buoyant Upholstery Ltd will continually improve and implementing policies and processes to guard against modern slavery and to uphold human rights in our operations and supply chain.

The Company will not support or trade with any organisation or business that is believed to be involved in these practices.

Our Business

Buoyant Upholstery Ltd was founded in 1909 originally located in Sandiacre, near Nottingham and moved in Nelson, Lancashire in 1973.

We are one of largest manufacturers in the UK. We design, manufacturer and deliver an extensive range of upholstery furniture to most of the multiple retailers such as Furniture Village, Sofology, DFS, John Lewis and Oak Furniture Land Group alongside smaller, independent customers. We are noted for always following our guiding principles: best product, best customer service and best value for money. The business employs over 650 employees. All our products are handmade to order at our plant in Nelson.

Our Supply Chain

We have long standing relationships with the majority of our suppliers, with whom we share the same commitment to ensuring that modern slavery does not exist within the supply chain.

Our Buying Team are in regularly contact with our major overseas suppliers and their support to adhering the Modern Slavery Act is of paramount importance.

Due diligence and risk identification

We acknowledge that the manufacturing sector as a whole is high risk in terms of the number of imported commodities linked to forced or child labour. This risk is heightened in the case of global supply chains, as we may have less visibility of suppliers beyond the first tier. As an organisation, we recognise that there is a risk of modern slavery in any area of our business where there:

Is migrant labour (country to country or within a country);

• Is a high presence of refugees;
• Are young workers and a risk of child labour;
• Are contract and agency workers.

Buoyant Upholstery Ltd undergoes regular independent audits at our sites, in-line with the Ethical Trade Initiative Base Code.

Buoyant Upholstery has become the first company in the furniture sector to join the Slave-Free Alliance, the social enterprise launched by global anti-slavery charity Hope for Justice with the aim of preventing worker exploitation in global supply chains. Hope for Justice runs prevention programmes, rescue, advocacy and after service to restore victims lives and works with government and organisations to reform society.

Our policies

The process of review and implementing our policies and procedures is a continual one and we will maintain this approach to ensure that these policies remain compliant with all UK Legislation. In order to our operations, we implemented a code of conduct policy document available on Buoyant Upholstery website.

Slave-Free Alliance offers a wide range of services and access to its experts, including training, gap analysis, due diligence, risk management resources, and help with investigations, crisis response, remediation and Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Statements (required for large businesses under the UK’s Modern Slavery Act 2015, but having one is considered good practice for organisations of all sizes).

The partnership between Buoyant Upholstery and Slave-Free Alliance will include: protecting the organisation and its people from modern slavery practices; legal compliance and staying abreast of legislative changes; demonstrate commitment to addressing modern slavery risk; and increase confidence in adapting to the evolving practice of modern slavery.

To ensure a high level of understanding of the risks of modern slavery and human trafficking in our supply chains and our business, with the help of Slave Free Alliance we will provide training to our key staff. Our commitment to addressing any instances or risks of modern slavery is communicated to all suppliers and other business partners when entering into new or renewed contracts with them.

Training

All our line managers, team leaders and supervisors have been given relevant Modern Slavery training in conjunction with Slave Free Alliance a leading independent organisation and Bribery and Corruption training with the Lancashire Chamber of Commerce. In addition to this, further training was conducted on how to handle conflict and deal with bullying and harassment.

The prevention, detection and reporting of modern slavery in any part of our organisation or supply chain is the responsibility of all those working for us or on our behalf. Workers must not engage in, facilitate or fail to report any activity that might lead to, or suggest, a breach of this policy.

We expect all of our employees, suppliers, customers, business partners, the general public and any relevant third party to raise any concerns or suspicions that they have about any of our procurement processes in complete confidence. Concerns can be reported confidentially to the following phone number 0300 008 0044 or info@slavefreealliance.org – Slave Free Alliance. 24-hour hotline available via the Modern Slavery Helpline 08000 121 700 or www.modernslaveryhelpline.org

We understand that the potential for modern Slavery will need on-going assessment and actions to mitigate risk. As such, our approach is based on continually reviewing the effectiveness of our policies, exercising due diligence when engaging with new suppliers, carrying out performance reviews, and taking seriously any issues or complaint by undertaking appropriate investigations and remedial action.

If we find that other individuals or organisations working on our behalf have breached this policy, we will ensure that we take appropriate action. This may range from considering the possibility of breaches being remediated and whether that might represent the best outcome for those individuals impacted by the breach to terminating such relationships.

This statement is made pursuant to section 54 (1) and has been approved by the Board of Directors. This document constitutes as our Modern Slavery Act Transparency Statement for the financial year ending September 2023.

Glen Ainsworth - Development Director

These Conditions apply to the Contract to the exclusion of all previous agreements and understandings between the parties and any other terms that the Supplier seeks to impose or incorporate, or which are implied by trade, custom, practice or course of dealing and these Conditions shall, unless otherwise agreed in writing by Buoyant, apply to all future supplies of the Goods and/or Services.

View PDF

These Conditions apply to the Contract to the exclusion of all previous agreements and understandings between the parties and any other terms that the Buyer seeks to impose or incorporate, or which are implied by trade, custom, practice or course of dealing and these Conditions shall, unless otherwise agreed in writing by Buoyant, apply to all future supplies of the Goods.

View PDF

The Company is committed to providing basic rights and freedoms that every person in the world should be entitled to, regardless of citizenship or immigration status. Based on core principles such as dignity, legitimacy, fairness, accessibility, equality, respect, transparency, autonomy and rights-compatible. Giving greater effect to rights and freedoms guaranteed under the European Convention on Human rights.

View PDF