Eastern Iowa Farmer Fall 2021

a big year
rt
Tightness in the supply chain
and rising prices for things like
lumber started last year and
finally started relaxing at the
end of the second quarter, only
to be replaced by a shortage in
anything that contains resin –
siding, windows, and plastic
used in such things as electric
boxes. Wait time for these types
of items to come in was weeks
or sometimes months.
From the retail store perspective
at Cascade Lumber,
employee Al Blatz said a paint
shortage – particularly the
color red – was an issue that
began last summer. Red was
the color paint the store used
to mark trusses in the lumber
yard. They switched to using
burgundy paint as a result.
Unusual icy weather last
February in Texas caused many
of the raw ingredients for paint
to freeze and become unusable.
That, on top of the increase in
construction and remodeling,
squeezed supply.
Kueter said in mid-July that
he was still having problems
stocking anywhere between
400 and 800 items in his store,
which has an estimated 50,000
items on the shelves at any
given time.
“I still have purchase orders
from last March (2020) that are
unfulfilled,” Kueter said. However,
his wall of garden tools
is full, and he, Noonan and
other merchants have focused
more energy on finding new
suppliers and alternative items
to stock.
The summer of 2020 was
particularly trying as people
ramped up home improvement
projects, yardwork and gardening
as the pandemic kept them
home.
“I couldn’t get a lawnmower
for the life of me,” Kueter
said, adding that the models
he ordered in February never
showed up. Canning lids were
nonexistent. Cleaning supplies
flew off the shelf as soon as
they were stocked.
He had a woman come into
the store from Madison, Wisconsin,
looking for a garden
tiller. She was stopping everywhere
she could think of, traveling
farther and farther away
from her home base. Kueter
ordered one for her, and, to his
surprise, it arrived weeks later.
She drove back to Bellevue to
pick it up.
Adjusting business practices
to whatever the current economic
climate happens to be is
something retailers know they
must do.
“There’s no doubt it’s been
stressful,” Noonan said. “This
is a retail business. Things will
be back to normal, but it is hard
to say what the new normal
is.” n
“I’ve increased
my suppliers. I’m
always asking
myself, ‘If I can’t
get this, then
what’s a good
replacement
that’s reasonably
close?’”
— Jesse Keuter
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9/15/21 10:24 am