The Salesforce Sustainability Exhibit: A Guide to Supplier Emissions Reporting

Salesforce's climate position is clear and public. The company has committed to cutting the intensity of its scope 3 market-based emissions by 68% by FY31 and 97% by FY41, and it asks every supplier to set a science-based target to help get there. Most of Salesforce's footprint sits in its value chain, which is why it turns those commitments into firm expectations of the businesses it buys from.

The mechanism it uses is the Sustainability Exhibit, a set of binding climate provisions that Salesforce writes into its supplier contracts. It sits inside the wider Supplier Sustainability Program, but the Exhibit is the part with contractual teeth. If Salesforce is a customer, or you are bidding to become a supplier, this is what you will be asked to sign, and it sets out what you have to measure, report and reduce. It also carries a financial remedy if you fall short, so the reporting obligations are not just best practice, they are contractual. 

This guide covers what the Exhibit is, who it applies to, the key dates, what it requires, what you have to report and how, what happens if you fall short, and how to get ready.

What is the Salesforce Sustainability Exhibit?

The Sustainability Exhibit is a set of binding, climate-related contract provisions that Salesforce incorporates into its agreements with suppliers. Where the broader Supplier Sustainability Program Guide explains Salesforce's expectations in plain terms, the Exhibit is what makes them enforceable.

It is not law, and it is not voluntary guidance. It works as a contractual obligation, which makes it as binding as any other term of doing business with Salesforce. It is added to your agreement in one of three ways: with a new contract, at renewal, or as an amendment to an existing one. Salesforce says the Exhibit is designed to be adaptable to a supplier's size, industry and geography, while keeping its intent and ambition intact.

The current guidance around the Exhibit was last updated in April 2026, and is based on the version of the Exhibit released in June 2024.

Who does the Salesforce Sustainability Exhibit apply to?

Salesforce is direct about who its expectations cover. Asked whether they apply, the Program Guide answers "in short, yes." The expectations behind the Exhibit are written to apply to all suppliers, whatever your size or sector, on the basis that some are already ahead and others are just getting started.

There is one distinction worth knowing. Each year, Salesforce identifies a group of "Priority Suppliers" based on relative spend, GHG emissions and other business considerations. Priority Suppliers get deeper engagement, so if you are a larger or more emissions-intensive part of the supply chain, expect closer contact and more scrutiny of your data.

The takeaway matches what we see with other large buyers like Microsoft and Apple. If Salesforce is a customer, assume the Exhibit is relevant and work out where you sit, rather than assuming you are too small or too far down the chain to be in scope.

What are the key dates and deadlines for Salesforce suppliers?

Most of the Exhibit's deadlines run from your Effective Date, the point at which the Exhibit becomes binding, rather than from fixed calendar dates. The clock starts from your own contract, not a shared industry deadline.

For context on Salesforce's own timeline, the company is targeting a 68% cut in the intensity of its scope 3 market-based emissions by FY31 and 97% by FY41. Supplier action is how a large part of that gets delivered.

What does the Salesforce Sustainability Exhibit require?

The Exhibit sets out five headline provisions. Together they move a supplier from measuring emissions, to reducing them, to compensating for what is left, and proving it independently.

1. Set a science-based target and work to achieve it. Submit a commitment letter to the SBTi within 90 days of signing, for at least a near-term target. Make a good faith effort to set and validate that target within two years of committing (or the current SBTi deadline, whichever is earlier), and to achieve it within its timeframe. If Salesforce asks, share your plan to get there. Smaller suppliers can follow the SBTi's streamlined route for SMEs, or make the SME Climate Commitment where the standard commitment letter is not available.

2. Report the emissions attributable to what you supply Salesforce. Disclose the GHG emissions arising from the products and services you provide, and publicly disclose your full Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions within a year of signing. These are binding obligations. Under the Exhibit, a material failure to disclose counts as a "climate deficiency", and if it is not put right it carries a financial cost, covered below. 

3. Deliver those products and services on a carbon neutral basis. Use carbon credits to compensate for the residual emissions tied to what you supply Salesforce. Two points matter here. It applies only to your Salesforce-related emissions, not your entire business. And credits used this way cannot count towards the reductions needed for your science-based target; in Salesforce's model, credits compensate for residual emissions, they do not replace the work of cutting them. Credits also have to meet Salesforce's own Carbon Credit Criteria.

4. Share a third-party sustainability scorecard each year. Maintain an annual scorecard from a recognised provider. Salesforce uses EcoVadis and CDP, with CDP its preferred route for disclosing emissions data, and looks for continuous improvement over time, not just a one-off submission.

5. Agree to a climate positive remedy. If a supplier cannot meet an obligation and does not put it right, this provision requires it to fund emissions removal or avoidance, so that even where things fall short, a better outcome for the planet is still achieved. More on how that works below.

What do Salesforce suppliers have to report, and how?

Two things sit at the centre of the Exhibit's reporting requirement. First, publicly disclose your full value chain emissions, Scope 1, 2 and 3, in line with the GHG Protocol, within a year of signing. Second, share the emissions allocated to Salesforce, or your carbon intensity, each year. If you are new to scopes, we explain them here.

This is the same principle large buyers increasingly apply across their supply chains. Microsoft asks for service-level accounting, isolating the emissions tied to the service it buys. Apple asks for a Covered Carbon Footprint, the emissions tied to the products it buys. Salesforce asks for allocated emissions or an intensity figure, expressed as tCO2e per US dollar, for what you supply.

Salesforce gives you three routes to share this data:

How does Salesforce assess supplier performance?

Salesforce maintains a scorecard for each supplier and rates performance against its Supplier Sustainability Evaluation Framework. The framework runs from meeting expectations up to far exceeding them. Where suppliers take part in a strategic business review, performance is scored on a scale of one to five. Salesforce sets a high bar, so a three, "meets expectations," is a good result.

The Program Guide shares indicative thresholds. It notes these are a close representation rather than every detail, that scores can be revised at Salesforce's discretion, and that a modified framework applies to small businesses. As a guide:

In practice, measuring and disclosing gets you to the table, and validation and year-on-year reductions are what move you up.

What happens if a Salesforce supplier falls short?

The Exhibit does not just set expectations, it puts a financial mechanism behind them: the climate positive remedy. A "climate deficiency" is any material breach of the Exhibit, so it covers more than missing a science-based target or failing to deliver on a carbon neutral basis. Failing to disclose your emissions or maintain a scorecard counts too.

The process is set out in the contract. If Salesforce identifies a deficiency, it issues a Climate Remediation Notice, and you have 30 days to put it right. If you cannot, you pay the climate positive remedy, and the amount is fixed in the Exhibit:

• For most deficiencies, including reporting and disclosure failures, it is 0.5% of what Salesforce paid you, or you invoiced Salesforce, over the prior 12 months.
• For a failure to deliver on a carbon neutral basis, it is the cost of the carbon credits you should have bought to cover those emissions.
• Across the life of the contract, the total is capped at 1% of the overall contract value.

A few things are worth knowing. The money is not paid to Salesforce. It funds emissions removal or avoidance through a provider Salesforce nominates, currently Cool Effect or the Gold Standard Foundation, though you can propose an alternative. Salesforce is also clear that this is a remedy, not a penalty. And termination is separate: a narrow, last-resort right, used only where a supplier's environmental actions are damaging enough to materially harm Salesforce's reputation.

There is a commercial reality alongside the contract too. Salesforce weighs supplier performance in its business reviews, so how you score feeds into the strength of the account over time. For most suppliers, that ongoing relationship is the bigger prize, and the bigger risk.

How should Salesforce suppliers prepare?

If Salesforce is a customer, or you are bidding for its business, a sensible sequence looks like this:

• Confirm where you sit. Work out whether you are likely to be a Priority Supplier and which obligations apply, so nothing catches you out at contract or renewal.
• Build a full-scope footprint. Measure Scope 1, 2 and 3 in line with the GHG Protocol, the recognised standard for carbon accounting.
• Allocate to Salesforce. Produce the emissions tied to what you supply, or a carbon intensity figure, on a basis you can document and stand behind.
• Commit to a science-based target. Get your SBTi commitment letter in within 90 days of signing, then work towards validation within two years. Smaller suppliers can use the SBTi's streamlined route for SMEs, or the SME Climate Commitment where the standard commitment letter is not available.
• Pick your disclosure route. Decide between CDP and EcoVadis, and keep the scorecard current.
• Treat it as an annual cycle. The first year is the hard part. Once the groundwork is done, each cycle gets faster and cleaner.

How Seedling can help

This is the kind of work we do every day. Seedling pairs carbon accounting platform with one-to-one support from a dedicated carbon expert, so you are not left to interpret a customer's requirements on your own. For suppliers facing the Salesforce Sustainability Exhibit, we can help you:

• Measure a full-scope footprint. Build a Scope 1, 2 and 3 inventory in line with the GHG Protocol, using activity data rather than spend estimates alone, so your numbers reflect real progress over time.
• Report the emissions tied to Salesforce. Produce the allocated emissions or carbon intensity figure you need to share, with the logic documented.
• Set a science-based target and a plan to hit it. Our Carbon Impact Lead, Henry Jones, is one of only a small number of SBTi Certified Experts in the UK, and can help you set a credible target and build the roadmap behind it.
• Support your disclosure. Whether you go down the CDP route or add emissions data to an EcoVadis assessment, we can help you prepare the numbers.

We have done similar work for businesses reporting to other major customers, including helping Janea Systems report their carbon data to Microsoft. The principle carries across: a solid inventory, a clean allocation to the customer in question, and the documentation to back it up.

If you would like to talk it through, you can book a demo or get in touch with the team.

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