National Hardwood Magazine - June 2015

PENN-YORK PHOTOS

PENN-YORK PHOTOS Continued from page 31 Joe Zona, Deer Park Lumber Inc., Tunkhannock, PA; Jesse La- Son, Rossi Group, Middletown, CT; Paul Kephart, Industrial Timber & Lumber, Beachwood, OH; and Bob Cafiero, J & J Log and Lumber Corp., Dover Plains, NY Jerry Thomas, Blue Ridge Lumber Co. LLC, Goshen, VA; Jackie Kriner, Carl Rosenberry & Sons Lumber Inc., Fort Loudon, PA; Cam Koons, Deer Park Lumber Inc., Tunkhannock, PA; and Aaron Russell, GMC Hardwoods Inc., Rome, PA Trevor Vaughan, Ron Jones Hardwood Sales Inc., Union City, PA; John Stokinger, Walker Lumber Co. Inc., Woodland, PA; Randy Flament, Emporium Hardwoods Inc., Emporium, PA; and Russ Shamblen, Premier Hardwood Products, Jamesville, NY June 15 Event: Penn-York Lumbermen’s Club Monthly Meeting Where: North East, PA Hosted by: Penn-Sylvan International Inc. 44 JUNE 2015 n NATIONAL HARDWOOD MAGAZINE

SOUTHWESTERN CLUB Continued from page 43 In southern Mississippi, a sales manager reported, “Poplar and Ash are good, but No. 1 and 2 Common Red Oak is challenging. We all miss our board road business.” A mill manager for the same company said, “Our sales average is dangerously close to the breakeven point now. We can get logs, but they are very high priced.” A purchasing agent for the largest buyers of railroad ties in the nation said, “Cross ties are an easy sell currently and we can’t get enough of them for the very strong demand right now. Switch ties are another matter and are harder to sell. Anyone in the cross tie business should see a good year because we don’t see demand slowing down at all this year.” A Tennessee lumberman reported, “In our area near the center of the state there are around 20 Amish mills. The bigger grade mills are struggling for logs due to rain, but the smaller mills seem to be able to get them in. The Amish mills’ cost of production is much lower than that of the bigger mills for several reasons. They don’t pay taxes and they don’t have minimum wage or insurance issues to deal with, so this gives them a real advantage over bigger mills with higher production costs.” One Alabama sawmill owner said, “When we get back to 1.4 million housing starts, business will be strong again. Right now my sheds are almost full of lumber. I am asking myself do I want to sell at today’s prices or put up another shed?” David Caldwell of the Hardwood Market Report, Memphis, TN, said, “We’re in a volatile market right now and there is confusion about production. There continues to be overproduction for demand, even though recently production is down around five percent. Going into this year we were oversupplied by 15 percent and we are still seeing the results of that. Production is still higher than we think demand and consumption is taking.” An Arkansas flooring mill buyer said, “Our lumber inventory is very high. We are currently operating our flooring mill at 36 hours a week. Flooring demand is weak. Plank flooring and engineered flooring is holding up okay at this point.” A wholesaler in the Mobile, AL, area said, “Laminated mats are way off right now. Canadian buyers are asleep at the moment. The price of oil needs to return to or a barrel for our buyers to get back into the market for buying mat material.” At the end of the meeting Joe Vaughn, secretary of the club, announced that the summer meeting will be held June 14-16 at Perdido Beach on the Gulf Coast. n JUNE 2015 n NATIONAL HARDWOOD MAGAZINE 45