So a few weeks ago I was extremely honored to give the
keynote address at the Texas Glass Association Glass Conference II. It really was a wonderful experience as the
folks from great state of Texas are some of the best around. They are truly classy and hospitable to the
end. The theme of my hour-long presentation
was “State of the Industry” where I spent around 30 minutes on economic
forecasts and then the rest on trends, concepts, events, and conclusions. On the forecast side I pulled data from 11
different sources and went through many different segments and
applications. The main takeaway I
provided after all of this research was that there is a softening of the
markets coming our way. It doesn’t look like it will be a long stretch and
there’s no indicators that show the weaknesses being 2008/9-like bad, but it
was interesting for me to get into all of the data and see this is what we have
coming. Basically some lighter volumes
into 2020 but things improving towards the end of next year and into 2021. One of the things I told the attendees was to
look at technology and innovation NOW vs. later. If you can improve yourself or your operation
now- meaning efficiencies etc. this is the time to do it. Don’t wait until next year that is for
sure.
The event overall was fantastic. Dustin Anderson of Anderson Glass had an
incredible presentation on the workforce of today and how to reach them. He’s become a very polished and natural
speaker- so he’s more than just a TV star these days. In addition I really enjoyed what Nathan
McKenna of Vitro and Erica Couch of Tri-Star delivered in their spots. Great stuff all the way around. Kudos to Felix Munson, Sam Hill, and everyone
at the TGA for a job well done!
Elsewhere…
-- I did also talk about the Architectural Billings Index (ABI)
and was waiting to see if we were back in the black this month after our first
down month in 2 years. Sure enough we
climbed into positive territory- barely at 50.5. I had a feeling it would pop up from its low
number in the previous month and now I see it treading water for while.
-- Glass Magazine review time… the issue has “Protector” on the
very snazzy cover and is the May 2019 edition.
The main theme is Glass & Metals 401- Guide to Protective
Glazing. With how important this segment
is in our world right now, I strongly recommend you grab the issue or check it
out online as the info in here is absolutely fabulous and necessary.
-- Ad of the month goes to CR Laurence. “The Building Envelope Simplified” was an
excellent ad piece that truly shows the power of glass and smartly showed where
CRL’s contributions were. The picture
and callouts did the heavy lifting and impressed me. Kudos to the minds behind that one!
-- I never fly in or out of JFK in NYC- but I may have to make
an exception some day to get to the new TWA hotel there. Looks incredibly cool!
-- Last this week… another GlassBuild plug from me. Don’t click away- read on please… have you
registered yet? Have you gotten the
hotel taken care of? If not do it now…
we have now passed Memorial Day and we all know this summer will fly by. There’s a ton of good pieces in the works for
the show and you will need to be there and especially if you are looking to the
advice I laid out at the top of the post- you HAVE to be there…. Any questions on it- please reach out to me!
LINKS of the WEEK
-- We see this every year and I never get tired of it! Dogs in the yearbook!
-- Another story we always see yet people seemingly don’t
learn. Please don’t leave your kid or pets in hot cars with the windows
up!
I love good news!
Good job young man!
VIDEO of the WEEK
This is a classic song, classic clip and just awesome
dancing… just brings a smile to the face!
No comments:
Post a Comment