Taylor Guitars and the UN Sustainable Development Goals

When Taylor Guitars co-founders Bob Taylor and Kurt Listug started building guitars in 1974, “sustainable development” wasn’t a recognized concept. A lot has changed since then. For starters, the human population has more than doubled, and the Earth has lost hundreds of millions of hectares of forest. And when it comes to buying wood to build guitars, “somewhere along the course of my career,” as Bob Taylor likes to say, “I stepped through the doorway from how it’s always been to how it now must be.” In this spirit, we recognize that today we must also prioritize transparency and thought that measuring our efforts against the UN Sustainable Development Goals was a good next step. 

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a set of ambitions that serve as a blueprint to achieve a more sustainable future. Adopted by all United Nations Member States, the SDGs are a call to action to partner together to achieve peace and prosperity for people and the planet. Taylor Guitars supports the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and focuses its reporting on the goals most relevant to its business and impact.

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Goal 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth

Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure

Goal 12: Responsible Consumption and Production

Goal 13: Climate Action

Goal 15: Life on Land

Goal 17: Partnerships for the Goals

Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all

Employee Ownership (ESOP)

Context:

On January 11, 2021, co-founders Bob Taylor and Kurt Listug announced that they had transferred ownership of the company to Taylor employees through the establishment of an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP). The company is now 100 percent employee-owned.

Impact:

An ESOP creates value for employees in several important ways—financial, psychological, and organizational. Taylor employees are given annual shares each year at no cost.  For many employees, an ESOP becomes an important retirement asset.

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Production On-Boarding

Context:

Taylor’s onboarding program gives employees a hands-on introduction to the full guitar-building process and helps them understand how their role supports each stage of production. Over two days, employees visit all five production departments to observe workflows, learn key responsibilities, and build confidence in their place within the operation.

Impact:

This approach provides safe, inclusive, and practical skill exposure that supports productive employment and reinforces our commitment to sustainable and decent work for all employees.

Skills Development (TGU)

Context

TGU is an online training platform for sales staff at authorized Taylor dealers’ to learn about Taylor’s brand, history, different guitar models, tonewoods, and sustainability efforts. 15-minute training modules include a combination of videos, text, images, and a quiz. Completed modules earn points that can be redeemed for Taylor products.

Impact

When salespeople better understand a product, they are better placed to help the customer and to succeed at their job.

Crelicam Ebony Mill

Context:

Our commitment to transforming the ebony trade in Cameroon centers on enhancing working conditions, transferring technology, and boosting in-country value-added processing. Since co-purchasing the Crelicam ebony mill in 2011, we have invested in improving working environments, providing training, and upgrading equipment. These efforts have significantly increased the value of ebony exports from Cameroon, ensuring a more sustainable and ethically responsible trade for the future.

Impact:

Cameroon now exports value-added ebony products rather than raw materials, creating better jobs and more economic benefit for the local community.

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Guitar Fundamentals

Context:

Guitar Fundamentals provides employees with a foundational understanding of guitar making through structured lessons, guided activities, and a hands-on project they complete and take home. The program builds technical skills, supports confidence in production tasks, and strengthens understanding of the craftsmanship within our environment. Participants explore tonewoods, model identification, basic guitar geometry, the Taylor neck-angle reset, and the characteristics of wood.

Impact:

This training offers safe, supported, and meaningful skill development aligned with our commitment to decent work and sustainable economic growth.

Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation

Innovative Design & Manufacturing

Context:

When Bob and Kurt founded Taylor Guitars, guitar-making hadn't changed much in decades. Their willingness to challenge convention led to innovations like the Taylor NT neck design—not only improving playability but also increasing wood yield, and our industry’s first introduction of robotic buffing and electrostatic spraying. This spirit of innovation continues today with the introduction of new tonewoods and our pioneering of variegated ebony fretboards.

Impact:

Our innovations extend the lifespan of our instruments, reduce material waste, and provide examples for how manufacturing can adapt to changing resources while maintaining—or even improving—product quality.

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Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns

Innovative Material Usage

Context:

Taylor Guitars is well-known as a leader in innovation, such as our patented neck design that increased mahogany yield and our groundbreaking decision to use variegated ebony fretboards. Taylor has introduced new tonewood species and pioneered sourcing wood from non-traditional sources.

Impact:

By reducing demand for traditionally used species from natural forests, using woods more efficiently, and challenging aesthetic norms around "perfect" tonewoods, we reduce pressure on forests while setting new industry standards. 

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Product Longevity

Context:

Every Taylor guitar is designed and built to last for generations, with innovations like our patented neck joint making service easier and extending instrument life. We are committed to building guitars that last for generations and reducing the environmental impact of our instruments over time. 

The Taylor Neck

Context:

Through the years, Taylor’s innovations with necks were designed to make them more easily adjustable, which allows the guitar the best chance of lasting several lifetimes. The original Taylor neck featured a glued fingerboard and hand-set bolted heel, making the neck easily removable by a trained service technician. Later, the dual shim Taylor Neck (NT) bolted to the body, making it even easier to adjust or remove. Most recently, Taylor introduced the Action Control Neck, which can be adjusted on the fly without detuning or neck removal.

Manufacturing Efficiency

Context:

From our factory design to our production systems, we constantly refine our processes to reduce material waste, energy consumption, and our overall environmental footprint.

Impact:

More efficient manufacturing means we can build more guitars with less environmental impact, while maintaining our high standards for quality and craftsmanship.

Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss

The Ebony Project

Context:

In 2016, Taylor Guitars launched the Ebony Project to conduct basic ecological research on a traditionally used tonewood and to plant ebony and fruit trees in several small villages that buffer a U.N. World Heritage Site in Cameroon. Implemented by the Congo Basin Institute, the Project has produced landmark research and developed a vibrant community-based planting and agroforestry program.

Impact:

As of December 2025, the project has planted 47,561 ebony trees and 34,421 fruit trees. Planting continues. The project has also produced groundbreaker peer-reviewed scientific research.

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Siglo Tonewoods

Context:

In 2015, Taylor Guitars and Pacific Rim Tonewoods joined forces through a joint venture, Siglo Tonewoods, to develop a long-term supply of koa and help restore native forests in Hawaii. Silgo purchased 565 acres of pastureland, which, 150 years ago, was a lush native forest, and is methodically restoring the landscape and enhancing biodiversity by creating a closed-canopy forest that will ultimately produce twice the koa that Taylor Guitars currently uses. Elsewhere in Hawaii, Siglo collaborates with private landowners under a unique agreement: rather than simply purchasing koa logs, Siglo commits upfront to forest protection, weed control, and replanting— ensuring native ecosystems are restored and left in better condition than before harvesting.

Impact:

Partnering with the Hawaii Agriculture Research Center, the project has invested over $4.5 million in forest recovery and research, and established the largest koa seed orchard in Hawaii, propagating multiple lines of Fusarium-resistant trees, a soil-borne fungus first identified in Hawaii in the early 1980s. To date, Silgo has planted 32,000 disease-tolerant trees on 134 acres. Elsewhere across Hawaii, Siglo has enhanced the biodiversity of 700 acres of native Hawaiian forest through fence building, exotic species removal, and planting.

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Urban Wood Initiative

Context:

In partnership with West Coast Arborists (WCA), Taylor Guitars has pioneered a program to source high-quality tonewood from urban trees, creating value where there would have been waste. Urban trees are removed by cities and towns for any number of reasons, including age, disease, or infrastructure development. Traditionally, these trees have been discarded into the waste stream. Thanks to WCA’s sophisticated inventory management system, they identify select trees scheduled for removal and carefully set aside the wood for Taylor Guitars. Species such as Shamel ash, Ironbark eucalyptus, Blackwood, and Walnut, planted throughout California, have been spared the chipper and found new life as guitars. 

Impact:

The Urban Wood Initiative creates a circular economy for urban trees, providing incentives for municipalities to replant and maintain healthy urban forests. It also demonstrates that sustainability isn't just about preserving distant forests—it's also about recognizing the value in the trees in our towns and cities.

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Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development

Hawaii: Pacific Rim Tonewoods, Siglo and the Hawaii Agricultural Research Center

Context:

In 2015, Taylor Guitars and Pacific Rim Tonewoods launched Siglo Tonewoods to ensure a sustainable koa wood supply for instruments and help restore Hawaii’s native forests. Siglo collaborates with private landowners to enhance ecosystems through forest protection, fencing, invasive species control, and tree planting. Additionally, co-founder Bob Taylor has acquired 565 acres of former pasture to restore with wilt-resistant koa and other native species, aiming to create a closed canopy forest that will ultimately yield more than double the koa currently used by Taylor.

Impact:

Over the last few years, 2,200 acres of native Hawaiian forest have been protected and restored. This initiative includes planting 30,000 koa trees and 6,000 mixed native trees and shrubs, increasing local biodiversity. Additionally, over 200 superior genetic mother trees have been identified, and seeds are being collected for disease resistance testing. Siglo Tonewoods has partnered with the Hawaii Agriculture Research Center to fund innovative seed collection and testing research, enhancing efforts over the past five years.

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Congo Basin Institute Partnership

Context:

The Congo Basin Institute (CBI)—a partnership between UCLA and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture—addresses vital issues like food security, biodiversity loss, climate change, and public health in the Congo Basin. CBI serves as a regional hub, uniting businesses, communities, and researchers to foster effective partnerships. 

Impact:

CBI implements the Taylor Guitars Ebony Project, designed to protect valuable timber species, restore degraded lands, and enhance rural livelihoods. Operating in 13 villages adjacent to essential conservation areas in Cameroon, the project has successfully planted over 80,000 trees. CBI is now a leader in producing original, peer-reviewed scientific research related to ebony ecology and serves as a key training center for emerging African scientists.

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West Coast Arborists Partnership

Context:

West Coast Arborists (WCA) specializes in professional tree maintenance and urban forestry services, working mostly under public contracts, helping local governments maintain safe, healthy trees in streets, parks, and public spaces.

Impact:

If a municipality asks WCA to remove a damaged or hazardous tonewood species, such as Blackwood, Shamel ash, and Ironbark eucalyptus, they will set aside to be processed and sold to build guitars. The urban wood partnership gives “end-of-life” city trees a second life as musical instruments instead of mulch or landfill.

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Industry Leadership

Context:

From quarterly newsletter, glossy magazines, podcasts, and its website, Taylor Guitars has been proactively communicating with the public for decades, discussing issues from changes to guitar design and build, guitar care and maintenance, to changes taking place in the global tonewood supply and emerging government policy, such as the US Lacey Act, the European Union Deforestation-free Regulation (EUDR) and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

Impact:

By sharing our guitar philosophy, attending industry and government meetings, and advocating for responsible policies, we hope to be a trusted resource for information.

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