August 27, 2018 — After a long and harsh June and July, the commodity markets for lumber and panels have experienced a turnaround in the past couple weeks, but not all at the same time. Suffice to say that most commodity items are stable, not...
August 20, 2018 — When we initially began constructing our engineered Mass Plywood Panel one question continually asked of us was, “What applications do you see your wood product used for in the future?” The answer always came back to, “The applications are only limited...
August 13, 2018 — Housing starts affected by increased material prices. Housing sales are up 2.4% over last year. Existing inventory of new homes sits at a very tight 4.3 months of inventory at current sales pace. Both rental prices and homes prices are moving...
August 6, 2018 — Freres Lumber Company is proud to announce that they have received structural certification for their patent-pending product, the Mass Plywood Panel (MPP), by the APA*- The Engineered Wood Association, under ANSI/APA PRG 320 standards. Freres Lumber is only the third U.S....
July 30, 2018 — Buying as needed until western plywood market increases pace. The western plywood markets continued to struggle throughout July, part of the larger price swoon by all commodity lumber and panel products that has gone on for almost two months. Depending on...
July 16, 2018 — The APA has just issued Product Advisory SP-1185 title,“Imported Plywood Panels from Brazil Evaluated for Conformance to US Product Standard PS 1-09 Requirements.” Testing conducted by the APA indicates that Brazilian plywood panels stamped as structural panels meeting PS 1-09, DO...
July 9, 2018 — High Demand Predicts a Strong Buying Season. We are now into the summer building season. The strong buying season for wood products typically doesn't start until July and runs until October when winter weather begins to dampen short-term expectations. This year...
July 2, 2018 — One of the best aspects of our industry is how open and inviting other producers are to visitors. It is a fact that in the wood products industry some of our fiercest competitors may also be our best customers, which encourages...
June 25, 2018 — The month of June has been a bit disappointing, in that buying has so far been poking along all month. Fortunately, mills had decent order files to fall back on, so price adjustments have been modest. With commodity lumber and panel...
June 18, 2018 — The only constant in life is that nothing ever stays the same. Wood products markets, and veneer and panel markets, in particular, can be extremely unpredictable. Most years the markets bounce around the bottom until we reach June or July, we...