Rough Reports

Ok so two pieces of bad news last week. First the Architectural Billings Index took a nasty tumble. Then numbers from Canada on their non-residential building statistics came out lower than they have been. So it wasn’t exactly an uplifting few days. On the ABI, that continues to be a hard one to swallow, especially since our industry would see any effects from these lower totals middle of 2012. It will bear watching because if 2012 is solid or at least like 2011 has been for some patches of our industry it will blow the whole theory/report out of the water. As for the Canadian report, well all I could think of after reading it was the reaction of people in Toronto when you’d compliment them for being busy. They were seriously afraid that you’d jinx it… and gosh I wonder if I did… Here is the Canadian study by the way.

Elsewhere

-- Our industry has great new “APP” joining the excellent Glass Magazine APP that I mentioned last week. Guardian released their Sunguard application for Apple and I loaded it up and was very impressed. Very sharp, clean and easy to use. Major props to Chris Dolan and his team- a job well done. And if you want to download it, enter “Sunguard” in the search instead of Guardian- it will be easier to find.

-- I hated missing the GANA Fall Conference last week. I heard many good things and the worst part for me was missing a chance to hear the always intelligent and interesting Stanley Yee of The Façade Group. Stanley is as engaging as they come and a good guy for sure. Evidently his presentation on air leakage was a showstopper and I hated missing that and the rest of the event.

-- Had my 900th airport delay of the summer this past week but in a new airport for me. Cincinnati… and I must say, very nice airport- been stuck at much worse places.

-- Last week I linked to an article in Forbes about a possible water shortage and soon after my blog was published I got an e-mail from John Fallon of Water Treatment Technologies. John’s company does yeoman’s work in trying to get people to use and re-use water smartly and I am big fan of him and his company. Anyway, John pointed out that the Forbes piece is accurate (shocking to me in reality) and he went on to note the insane wastes of water from our industry. It is truly food for thought, if you are not recycling your water in your facility, you need to- it’s a no brainer and the right thing to do- and thanks again to John for getting my mind back on it.

-- Yes I am biased on this one because I like the product line and people involved but a great article HERE on how General Glass (GGI) produced the glass for the Harlem Hospital. (Installed by W&W and insulating by JE Berkowitz- what a high-powered group) Very intense stuff. Also interesting is that job is actually not complete yet even though it seems like the glass has been up for years.

-- Congrats to PPG on their awesome 3rd Quarter. As I have noted here before they have some awesome people that make a difference out there. Happy for all of those that worked so hard to achieve it.

-- Last this week, in my new life I have been running into other quality folks who call consulting their career- some great ones like Greg Carney and Arlene Stewart I knew, but I did not know Rick De La Guardia. Well now I do, the guy is a tremendous asset from engineering side and it’s pretty awesome to be in the same realm. Very neat things you learn when you find yourself in a new world that is for sure.

LINKS of the WEEK:

-- Wild story about a plane losing cabin pressure. I have never heard of the airline and I have a hard and fast rule, if I’ve never heard of the airline, I’m not flying on it.

-- When this link was sent to me, my friend said I should do this for a show I would attend… it would be easy- it would be 15 bald guys. Fun link.

I don’t know how I feel about this one. Company can’t find workers…. But really is also not offering much either. At least most in the glass industry offer benefits. Plus when this product "makes it" they'll go off shore to make the stuff. No doubt.


VIDEO of the WEEK:

So my brother has become addicted with finding me videos of the week. And people are noticing. Our good friend Cash called me this week and wondered if my bro was bored in his new gig…. Funny. (Trust me he's not) Anyway this week he found this awesome band performance from of all places, my Alma mater- Ohio University- and starting at the 1 minute mark, you’ll see why they are known as “the most exciting band in the land”