Goodbye 2020: A Review of this Roller Coaster Year and a Look at 2021
We also added Nicolok Concrete Pavers. The addition of Nicolok and Sedalia significantly enhanced our hardscape product offering with great customer feedback. We added Glen-Gery Brick and Watsontown Brick to our brick offerings. These two top-notch brick companies enable us to provide a wider range of colors and textures. Check out these product lines and more at boxley.com for design ideas, technical data and installation techniques.
The Unexpected.
In March, our best laid business plans required a big pivot as the virus hit and we expected construction to come to a grinding halt. Instead, commercial construction remained steady and residential construction really took off creating a new set of industry challenges. Masonry, along with other trades, had a difficult time keeping up with demand and inventory supply became an issue. Fortunately, most of our masonry and hardscape vendors feel like they are catching up and now have a handle on inventory supply for 2021. Again, this year, we are working with our vendors to keep prices as competitive as possible. Cement and lightweight aggregate increases will drive the concrete masonry unit increase to about 5%, while most veneer items will only increase a few cents per square foot.
Stay Calm And Carry On: Promoting Our Industry
We’re proud to have sustained our effort to promote our industry. A shift to remote learning enabled us to continue offering continuing education courses to architects and engineers. In fact, by working through the Southeast Concrete Masonry Association, we increased the number of free masonry classes to architects in 2020. Working with local and state associations, as well as some of our customers, we are collaborating on the creation of a masonry workforce development program. We need your help as this needs to be an industry-wide effort. Stay tuned for more information on that later in 2021.
Supporting Our Communities.
Boxley’s Team 360 had a very successful year with our community outreach and environmental stewardship. Our Team Members found meaningful ways to continue to support our communities. Keep an eye out for our 2020 corporate responsibility report this spring.
Our Commitment to You
Our Mission at Boxley is to deliver quality on every project backed by our commitment to safety, service and reliability. Hopefully we have done that for you in 2020 and we will continue to do it in 2021. Thank you for your business. We are looking forward to a great 2021!
Sincerely,
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Brent Gleason |
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