MDM Staff, Author at Modern Distribution Management - Page 735 of 791

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Economic Trends
Final GDP Estimated 2Q Growth at 3.8%
Real gross domestic product -the output of goods and services produced by labor and property in the U.S. -increased at an annual rate of 3.8% in the second quarter of 2007, according to final estimates released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the first quarter, real GDP increased 0.6%.
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These GDP estimates are based on more complete source data than were available for&nbsp ; the preliminary estimates issued last month. In the preliminary estimates, the increase in real GDP was 4%.
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The acceleration in real GDP growth in the second quarter primarily reflected a downturn in imports, upturns in federal government spending and in private inventory investment, accelerations in exports, in nonresidential structures, and in equipment and software, and a ...
Finance
Building Materials Holding Corp. Sells Retail Units
Building Materials Holding Corporation, San Francisco, CA, a supplier of construction services and building materials to professional residential builders and contractors, announced its subsidiary, BMC West Corporation, has sold three retail-oriented business units in Western Colorado for $11.4 million.
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The buyer is West Canyon Investments, an affiliate of Harbert Lumber, Grand Junction, CO. Sales for these three operations in 2006 were $40 million or 3% of BMC West.
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The sale is another step in BMC West's continuing strategy to focus on professional builders and contractors and to emphasize value-added products and services, including manufacture and installation of millwork and structural components, in addition to lumber and materials ...
Free
Succession Plan Ensures Leviton Stays in the Family
The late Harold Leviton has appointed sons-in-law Donald J. Hendler as CEO and Stephen B. Sokolow as chairman of the Board of Directors of Leviton Manufacturing Company. The appointments were made through a succession plan to ensure the company would be run by family as it has since his father started the electrical manufacturer in 1906.
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Hendler was named president in 2005, and Sokolow was named Vice Chairman the same year.
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The Leviton family business will continue to grow as we embark on our second century in business," said Donald Hendler, president and CEO of Leviton. "I am proud to accept leadership responsibility on behalf of Harold and the Leviton family. We have a number of exciting initiatives planned for the coming months and both Steve and I look ...
Finance
Air Liquide Subsidiary to Buy Scott Specialty Gases
American Air Liquide Holdings, Inc., an Air Liquide affiliate, has agreed to buy Scott Specialty Gases, Inc., an international producer and supplier of mixed and pure high specialty gases to the analytical, medical and electronics sectors, and of gas handling equipment and specialty gas delivery systems.
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Headquartered in Plumsteadville, PA, Scott employs 450 people with annual sales of $88 million. It covers the U.S. market with centers in the Northeast, Midwest, Gulf Coast, Rocky Mountain and Pacific. Internationally, Scott is in the UK and the Netherlands as well as Europe, India, Africa the Middle East and Taiwan.
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The combined Air Liquide and Scott operations in the high-growth market for specialty gases will provide Air Liquide with a new platform for ...
Finance
Royal Adhesives Buys IAC Product Line
Royal Adhesives and Sealants LLC, South Bend, IN, has acquired the IAC Bond-Plus water base adhesives and coatings product line. The acquired product line consists of EVA, PVA and, acrylic latex water based adhesives and coatings that are primarily sold to the paper, graphic arts and laminating markets.
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Royal will be transferring production of these products to its manufacturing center in South Bend.


The acquisition is Royal's fifth in the past three years, following its acquisitions of ESC Adhesives in December 2004, Hardman Adhesives in June 2005, J & R industries in December 2005 and Basic Adhesives in April 2006. The company reports that all five acquisitions fit its strategy to acquire businesses focused on industrial market applications
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Free
Actuant Sales Up 21% in 2007
Actuant Corporation, Milwaukee, WI, reported fiscal 2007 sales increased 21% from the prior year to $1.46 billion, with net earnings at $105 million. Fourth-quarter sales were up 20% to $390 million.
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Organic growth was 6% for both the fourth quarter and the full year. Actuant acquired five businesses during the fiscal year and completed a sixth in September.
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Fourth quarter net earnings were $31.4 million, compared to prior year net earnings of $25.2 million.
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Fourth quarter Industrial segment sales increased 23% to $120 million. Excluding currency translation and acquisitions, Industrial segment sales grew 13% driven by continued strong global demand in both the joint integrity and high-force hydraulic tool product lines.
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Fourth ...
Economic Trends
Canadian Wholesale Revenues Rebound in July
Source: Statistics Canada

Following a weak second quarter, wholesale sales rebounded in July, spurred on by a turnaround in automotive sales, as well as healthy demand for machinery, and personal and household goods.
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Wholesalers sold an estimated&nbsp ; $44.1&nbsp ; billion worth of goods in July, a&nbsp ; 2.0% gain over June, surpassing the previous record high reached in March.
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The key automotive products sector led the way with a&nbsp ; 4.9% gain on the back of strong demand for motor vehicles. July also proved to be a good month for wholesalers of personal and household goods (+4.0%), machinery and electronic equipment (+2.8%), and building materials (+1.3%). Sales excluding the automotive sector rose&nbsp ; 1.3% in July.
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Economic Trends
Manufacturing Shipments Up in Canada
Source: Statistics Canada

Manufacturing shipments rebounded from a sharp&nbsp ; 2.0% drop in June, gaining&nbsp ; 2.3% to&nbsp ; $50.0&nbsp ; billion in July, the highest level since March. Most of the strength in July came from a return to more normal shipment levels by motor vehicle manufacturers following a sharp decrease in June.


Manufacturing shipments have been heavily influenced by fluctuations in the transportation equipment industry over the past several months. Excluding the motor vehicle and parts industries, shipments advanced&nbsp ; 0.4% in July for the fifth gain in the last six months.

Using constant dollars, which take price fluctuations into account, the volume of manufacturing shipments increased&nbsp ; 4.3% to&nbsp ; ...
Finance
Wilden Pump Acquires Griswold Pump Co.
Wilden Pump & Engineering has acquired Griswold Pump Company, Thomasville, GA. With the acquisition, Wilden, a division of Dover Corp., will have annualized sales of more than $140 million.
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Griswold manufactures ANSI centrifugal pumps for use in the petroleum, petrochemical, wastewater and pulp & paper industries.
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Wilden, whose international business exceeds 60% of total sales, has locations in Dusseldorf, Shanghai, and Chennai, respectively. International growth will be a highlighted area in Griswold's strategic plan going forward.
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Wilden says it will use its distributor network in introducing the Griswold line to a worldwide ...
Free
Acme United Expands Knife, Cutting Business
Acme United Corporation, Fairfield, CT, has acquired the knife and cutting business of Tiger Sharp Technologies, Inc. The purchase price was $350,000. Revenues were approximately $400,000 in 2006.
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Tiger Sharp manufacture extremely sharp replaceable blade pocket knives, and distributes them to independent knife dealers, industrial wholesalers, and companies such as John Deere and Browning.
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The recent acquisition of Camillus Cutlery provides Tiger Sharp with a well known brand of knives to incorporate its technology. It acquired Camillus for $200,000 earlier this month; the assets were acquired after Camillus filed for bankruptcy. Revenues were $18 million in its final year.
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Acme United is a supplier of cutting devices, measuring instruments, ...
Finance
Dana Corp. Completes Sale of Fluid Products Businesses
Dana Corporation, Toledo, OH, has completed the sale of its North American coupled products business to Coupled Products LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Wanxiang (USA) Holdings Corporation.
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The sale concludes the divestiture of Dana's fluid products business. Last month, the company closed the sale of its North American fluid products hose and tubing operations to Orhan Holding, A.S. Dana previously sold its European fluid products hose and tubing operations to Orhan in July 2007.
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The completion of this divestiture marks another important step in Dana's efforts to concentrate our resources on the core products and competencies that are the foundation for our future growth," said Dana Chairman and CEO Mike Burns.
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The coupled products plants ...
Plumbing Products & PVF Distribution
U.S. Residential Market Slows Wolseley Annual Sales
Global HVAC, plumbing and building materials distributor Wolseley plc reports there are no signs yet of any upturn in the U.S. housing market; it is also seeing the repairs, maintenance and improvement market starting to soften. A weaker dollar and price deflation in lumber and panels has also hurt its North American building materials business.
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In its preliminary results report for the year ended July 31, 2007, Wolseley had sales of 16.2 billion pounds (US$32.7 billion), up 14.6% from the previous year. Operating profit fell slightly.
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North American revenues declined slightly overall, reflecting slow sales by Stock Building Supply hit by the weak U.S. residential market. Ferguson, the plumbing/HVAC business, had 5.5% organic growth. Operating profit in ...
Finance
DXP and Precision Merger Complete
Power transmission and bearing distributor DXP Enterprises, Inc., Houston, TX, has finished its acquisition of Precision Industries for $106 million. The acquisition is DXP's largest and nearly doubles the distributor's size. Precision has a run rate of $250 million in sales in 2007. In the Aug. 25, 2007, issue of MDM, we presented Precision's reason for selling the company. Recently, DXP held a conference call on the purchase and shared its reasons for making the acquisition. The following is an excerpt from comments made by DXP CEO David Little during that call:
Precision Industries fits within our primary acquisition criteria of acquiring companies that allow us to gain access to new geography, strengthen our product and service offering and have established and accomplished ...
Free
Survey: Premiums Up 6.1% in 2007
Annual premiums for family coverage now average $12,106, according to one annual survey, with workers paying $3,281.


Health insurance premium growth was the slowest since 1999 when premiums rose 5.3 percent.

Premiums saw a 6.1 percent increase in 2007, according to the 2007 Employer Health Benefits Survey released by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Health Research and Educational Trust.

The average health benefit cost per employee is expected to rise 6.7 percent in 2008, the Mercer Health Benefits survey of employers found. In 2006, employers saw a 6.1 percent increase in costs. The percentage of the workforce (60 percent) obtaining coverage from employer-sponsored plans remained unchanged since 2006. (See graphic on page 7.)
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Free
News Digest 3718
Wolseley plc, a global distributor of plumbing and heating products as well as building materials, announced five bolt-on acquisitions this month, including two by Ferguson and two in Europe. These acquisitions are expected to add 110 million pounds to total revenue.


Wolseley subsidiary Stock Building Supply has acquired ProSource Building Supply Ltd, Houston, TX, a construction services business supplying commercial doors, trim, hardwood, related specialty products and installation services. In the year ended Dec. 31, 2006, ProSource had revenue of $17.2 million. The acquisition is in line with Stock's goal of expanding in the commercial and industrial markets. More&nbsp ;

Another Wolseley ...
Research & Analytics
Canadian Market Analysis: MRO Products

The industrial product group listed here - MRO Products - represented a market in 2006 of $34.8 billion, according to estimates by Industrial Market Information, Minneapolis.


These charts show the top ten industries, by SIC code, consuming these products; and the 2006 end-user consumption of these groups sorted by the 12 Canadian government market regions. ...

Economic Trends
MDM Inflation Index: August 2007
Modern Distribution Management's August Inflation Index, which measures a cross-section of industrial supplies, was up 0.35% from the previous month, and up 3.04% from August 2006.


Summary of&nbsp ; MDM Inflation Index for the past 12 months:

August 2007 Index 273.3
July 2007 Index 272.4
June 2007 Index 271.7
May 2007 Index 271.2
April 2007 Index 270.8
March 2007 Index 269.6
February 2007 Index 269.4
January 2007 Index 268.7
December 2006 Index&nbsp ; 267.1
November 2006 Index 266.5
October 2006 Index 265.9
September 2006 Index 265.6
August 2006 Index 265.2

Please click below to view a print-ready pdf of the&nbsp ; MDM Inflation Index for August 2007, listing the ten individual product ...
Subscriber Only
MDM September 25, 2007
This is the pdf of this issue of Modern Distribution Management. Apply the full $24.95 pay-per-view cost toward an annual subscription (within 30 days of purchase), which includes two issues a month plus access to more than six years of online archives and market data. Call 1-888-742-5060 or email info@mdm.com to ...
Economic Trends
Wholesale Prices Fall in August
The Producer Price Index for Finished Goods fell 1.4 percent in August, seasonally adjusted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported.&nbsp ; &nbsp ; This decrease followed a 0.6-percent increase in July and a 0.2-percent decline in June. &nbsp ; At the earlier stages of processing, prices received by manufacturers of intermediate goods moved down 1.2 percent in August compared with a 0.6-percent advance in July, and the crude goods index dropped 3.0 percent after climbing 1.2 percent in the prior month.


Accounting for most of the downturn in finished goods prices, the index for energy goods fell 6.6 percent in August following a 2.5-percent rise in the prior month. &nbsp ; Prices for consumer foods declined 0.2 percent after inching down 0.1 ...
Free
U.S., Canadian PT/MC Sales Drop in July
Power Transmission Distributors Association today released July 2007 month-end trend data for distributors and manufacturers of power transmission/motion control (PT/MC) products.
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U.S. distributors'sales of PT/MC products dropped 7.0 percent from June to July after a rise in sales for the past two months.&nbsp ; Year-to-year comparisons remain positive for the first half of this year with sales in July 2007 coming in 11.0 percent higher than in July 2006.&nbsp ; Accounts receivable collection days rose 2.7 percent over June 2007.&nbsp ; The July 2007confidence index for U.S. distributors remained unchanged for the fifth month in a row at 6.6 (on a 10-point scale).
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Canadian distributors'sales in PT/MC products continue to fall, dropping 9.0 percent from ...

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