The markets are good on the West Coast with the exception of one state, in which the market is mixed. In Washington, a lumberman stated, “Everybody’s busy, so I’d have to say the market is good.” However, he noted, the market is “probably not as good as six months ago” due to “the seasonality of it all.” On a positive note, he said, “From what we’ve seen, there’s plenty of homebuilding going on.” He sells Red and White Oak and Hard and Soft Maple in No. 1 and Better and some No. 2. “Hard Maple’s been pretty good across the board,” he observed. Customers are end users. “Our customers are doing well,” he stated. “They’re kind of baffled that business is so good.” A great difficulty, he said, is transportation. “It’s been a challenge for 90 to 120 days. You can see prices are going up. Container prices are going up. Transportation time has increased. From the East Coast to the West Coast, transport usually takes about a week. One container was 20 days on the rail. That’s a long time. It’s across all industries.”
A source in Oregon remarked, “Parts of the market are very good, and parts of it are not so good. So, it’s kind of a mixed bag. We’re making the best of the good aspects and trying to make something out of what’s not so good. What’s not so good is commercial hospitality, with the pandemic going on. The trade show business is not very good, as well. The best part of our business is cabinetry and millwork. Residential cabinetry and millwork are the two best parts of our business.” Compared to six months earlier, the market is “about the same,” he noted. “It’s trending about the same month in and month out.
“We’re a full-line distributor, so we have all of the domestic species and a whole lot of the import species as well. We stock about 40 species of lumber. It’s quite extensive. Poplar, domestically, is far and away the best seller, by a ratio of 3-1 or maybe 4-1 over the next closest domestic specie. On import, the best seller is Sapele.”
The primary customer base is made up of cabinet manufacturers, store fixture manufacturers and furniture makers. Kitchen cabinet makers are busy. Store fixture companies’ markets depend on what type of business they’re selling into. If they’ve got a lot of big box businesses, they’re busy. The restaurant trade is down a lot. Small, regional retail is doing OK.”
In terms of challenges, “Availability of lumber is probably the biggest issue,” he said. “We sell a lot of plywood as well, and we have issues on the panel side. In domestic Hardwood, the hottest species are some of the hardest things to get, White Oak specifically.”
“Business has been good,” remarked a California representative. However, “I would say business is still order-to-order. Customers don’t order until they absolutely need the lumber. I think that’s been a trend for the last year. Nobody wants to hang onto inventory. Then again, there’s not that much inventory out there. That’s what they don’t quite realize. If you don’t have inventory, you’re not going to have a lot of orders.” Compared to six months earlier, he estimated that the market is “about the same.” He sells White Oak, Walnut and Hickory in FAS, No. 1 and No. 2, “all for flooring,” he observed. Customers include end users, distributors and retailers. “They say they’re steady,” the supplier commented. “It’s whoever has the inventory who has a chance of getting the order. That’s how it is.” Transportation isn’t an issue, he said.
Another trend he has noticed is that, “People are willing to put money in their houses because of the pandemic. I’d say the remodel market is getting stronger because of that. That’s definitely a trend. I see that being solid all through next year, too.”
