What do SEC filings reveal about forest products companies' costs?

It depends on the company, more than it used to. Since annual reports for fiscal years beginning after 15 December 2023, companies reporting under US accounting rules must show more in their segment notes. For each reportable segment, they list the expense categories that pass the standard's significance test and that the chief executive or other chief decision maker regularly reviews. In the four forest products annual reports we read, that ranged widely. One pulp producer breaks out fiber, maintenance, freight, labour, chemicals and energy by segment. Others show a single cost-of-sales line. For unit costs and prices, the management commentary often says more.

What the usual answer says

Guides to annual reports list where costs appear: the income statement, cost of sales, segment results, the management commentary and risk factors on raw materials, energy and freight. All true. Most were written before the segment rules changed, and they treat the segment note as a short table of revenue and profit.

What changed in the segment note

The standard setter issued the new rule in November 2023. KPMG's summary describes a new requirement to disclose segment expenses that meet the standard's threshold and are "regularly provided to the chief operating decision maker (CODM)". It also requires companies to "extend certain annual disclosures to interim periods" and to disclose the decision maker's title and position. For calendar-year companies, the quarterly requirement started in 2025.

RSM's guide sets out the three tests: a category must be regularly provided to the decision maker, included in the segment's measure of profit or loss, and meet the significance threshold. Everything else goes into a line of "other segment items". A company with a single reportable segment "must provide all existing segment disclosures", including the new ones.

What four forest products filings show

We read four annual reports filed in 2025 and 2026 under the new rules. A pulp and solid wood producer's segment note lists fiber, maintenance, freight, labour, chemicals, energy, purchased pulp and other costs for each segment. Fiber is the largest line in both. A timber REIT's note shows costs of sales, selling, general and administrative expenses and other items for its three segments. It gives no split of wood or log cost. A treated-wood and building products maker says its chief executive assesses segments on "net sales, cost of goods sold, earnings from operations and net earnings". A wood products manufacturer and distributor reports one line for materials, labour and other operating expenses. Its useful detail is in the commentary: volumes and average net selling prices for each main product.

So the filings reveal how each management team looks at cost, and that varies a lot. Deloitte's review of Fortune 500 adopters, published in August 2025, covered first-year reports from about 70 percent of the list. It found the same across industries: the disclosures "vary widely among registrants, even those in similar industries".

Where else to look

The form itself has changed since older guides were written: in the current Form 10-K instructions, Item 6 is "[Reserved]". Item 7, management's discussion and analysis, is where the reasons for cost movements appear, and in this industry often unit prices and volumes. Item 7A, "Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk", shows which inputs a company treats as exposures.

For a private mill benchmarking itself against listed peers, dollar totals are rarely enough. A cost only becomes comparable once it can be divided by volume, and only some filings give volumes. Where they do, cost or price per unit from the commentary, tracked quarter by quarter, is the most useful thing the filings offer.

Reading them as data

Record each company's categories as it defines them, with the filing and period, before mapping them to a common template. Compare each company with itself before comparing it with peers. Filings are tagged in a machine-readable format, so segment expense lines can be pulled from each report without re-keying. AI can help match commentary sentences to the figures they explain. Whether two companies' categories mean the same thing remains a judgement.

When it doesn't apply

Private companies file none of this, and many forest products businesses are private. Companies reporting under international standards, as some foreign filers in this industry do, follow different segment rules. And segment categories follow management reports. They reveal little about costs a company doesn't track separately, such as one mill's.

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Quarri is an AI-native data platform for the timber supply chain. It connects buying, production, sales and inventory for forest management, sawmill, wood products and pulp, paper and packaging operators.