August 25, 2020 — The Freres family recently went back to the classroom. More specifically, they visited the Freres Family Classroom in the new George W. Peavy Forest Science Center at Oregon State University. The Center opened in 2020 following years of planning and construction....
August 10, 2020 — It is amazing the difference that two months can make. Our markets are in a dramatically different place than early May, when COVID restrictions forced us to take a week down at most of our operations. Prior to our May shutdown,...
August 3, 2020 — Freres’ newly released Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for Mass Plywood Panels (MPP), has shown exciting results regarding the environmental sustainability of MPP. Before diving into these results, it may be helpful to review what an LCA is....
July 27, 2020 — The Western Plywood market continues its unrelenting march upward on prices, and outward on order files. We are now closing in on 3 months duration with the current bull run in place for commodity lumber and panel markets. Normally, when we...
July 13, 2020 — As states have opened after COVID-19 shutdowns, we have seen a rebound in plywood demand and significant improvement in wood product markets. ½” 4-ply sheathing is up 65% from market lows, reaching $530 last week in the Random Lengths panel report....
June 29, 2020 — And on the eighth day, God looked down on the earth he had created and said, “I need an old school conservationist, someone who will care for the forests I’ve created, someone who understands that I planted these forests for man’s...
June 22, 2020 — The western plywood markets continue to roll along, with persistent strength in panel and lumber markets in general. This current bull market in commodities is about 9-10 weeks old. During this period of time there have been slight pauses. However, it...
June 15, 2020 — Last fall, we announced that Freres Lumber joined nine other U.S. domestic plywood producers as the “U.S. Structural Plywood Integrity Coalition” to file a Lanham Act claim of false labeling against three U.S. certification agencies: PFS TECO, Timber Products Inspection and...
June 8, 2020 — Plywood price increases have been significant and sustained over the last 4 weeks. Half inch 4-ply CDX plywood started May at a low of $358 due to COVID-19. We have seen plywood prices increase to over $450 in the space of...
June 1, 2020 — Contractors are using Freres Lumber’s Mass Plywood Panel in innovative ways as we see MPP construction take off in Oregon and California. The benefits of MPP are apparent in many recent projects such as Project One in the San Francisco Bay...