Committee Sees Few Bright Spots in Steel

Participants in a recent conference call of the Sheet Metal/Air Handling Products Committee noted that declining prices of sheet metal and pre-fabricated products have not fostered any increase in business activity in their respective markets. Presently, members were not seeing any drop in equipment prices from suppliers as a result declining materials cost – steel, aluminum and copper. Contractor customers are also paying somewhat slower than in recent months. And contractors report that even end users with money to spend are holding off for any number of reasons – fear of spending money in the current economic climate, as well chances that prices may decrease even further and provide them a better deal sometime down the road. Buy American steel language in the proposed federal stimulus packages was viewed as likely to have little real impact on the HVAC business and was more for show than anything else.