President
“It has slowed down. There was a bubble that kind of happened, and I took advantage of it. I was thinking should I sell this hard and project into it with some Fir-Larch. I got after it hard for a few weeks and after that had to think if I should have done that or not. Well then, I come back this week and no one is buying anything so now I’m thinking that I made the right decision.” In addition, she highlighted that competing with Canadian prices remains to be a challenge and will be until something major changes.
Her company handles Spruce-Pine-Firs (manufactured south of the Canadian border) in 2×4, 2×6, 2×8, 2×10 and 2×12, Douglas Fir and Larch in No. 2 and Better and Select Struct and ESLP in 4/4 and dimension in Common No. 2 and Better and MSR grade. In her remarks, she added that Douglas Fir and Larch are her biggest product, but she is starting to carry more Spruce-Pine-Firs. “For 20 years around here the Forest Service didn’t sell any of their Spruce logs and it was all Fir-Larch. Due to the administrative changes and policy reviews and fires the last year or two they have made a lot more of that Spruce lodge pole type stuff available on Forest Service ground.”
She sells mostly to distribution yards and when asked how they were doing she remarked, “You know most of them are busy. They are busy in the specified lengths. I am banging my head on my desk because we finally learned as a sawmill how to quit making a bunch of 14 foot boards, but all of a sudden people need 14′ it seems. If I make a change in the log lengths we bring in and how we buck the logs for the sawmill, it will go back the other way after we make those changes.”
A lumber provider based in Utah also expressed facing challenges in the market at the time of this writing.
“We are doing as good as we can right now. It’s been a tough market for just about everybody. Everyone is kind of liquidating their inventory right now and getting the feel for what’s going on. As of this morning it’s still that sloppy market that we have been in for the last few weeks. There is a lot of volume that has been moved, but I think it’s more of a market that’s going to be what kind of prices are your customers willing to pay and how soon can you get it to them,” he commented. He handles a range of Softwood species that include SPF, Hem-Fir, Doug Fir, ESLP, and White woods in 2×4-2×12 and grades in Select struct to No. 3 utility and economy. “I would say that Douglas Fir has been a little bit stronger and has been that way for a while,” he added.
Large retail and independent contractor yards make up the majority of his customers and when asked how they were doing he made the following comments. “Most of them are sitting on inventory. Seems like they are trying to liquidate as well and find out where the market is going and have a target price in mind where they would like to buy. Anything with a flexible shipment status is a key item for our customers right now.”
A source in Idaho said that he is making some progress in his markets but has a lot of work remaining for the rest of the year to fully reach those pre-Covid levels.
“We are starting to catch up. We have been behind ever since the pandemic started. We are still about 30 days out. There is still a lot that needs to be produced and I can see us catching up but it’s going to be a stretch,” the source commented.
His sawmill handles only Split Rail Inland and Western Cedar and sells to “anybody and everybody. We sell to the big box to the mom and pops. Most of our stuff ends up in lawns and gardens and that market hasn’t changed too much over the years.”
He also noted, apart from sales, that they are currently facing challenges with labor. “We are way short on labor and struggling with the number of employees. I’d say we are down about three or four.”
