Robert W. Baird and Company (www.rwbaird.com) surveys over 40,000 US companies in the distribution of industrial products each quarter and receives responses from over 600 independent distributors and manufacturers with combined annual revenue of approximately $80 billion. Included in this group are a large sample of the 850+ US distributors of industrial gases and related hardgoods. This report highlights the Gases and Hardgoods Distributors’ responses to the 2Q 2011 Industrial Distributor survey.
Revenue & Pricing Trends: Revenue and pricing trends for Gases and Hardgoods respondents as compared to results from All Distributors (Overall) are shown in Figure 1.
Gases & Hardgoods: Revenue growth in Hardgoods again outpaced Gases during the quarter; however, consistent with recent quarters, the gap continues to slowly narrow. The differential stood at 3.7% last quarter, narrowing to 2.5% in 2Q11. As expected, both categories continue to see higher year/year (y/y) selling prices with Hardgoods very strong at + 6.0%. Certain majors remain aggressive in the market, placing continued pressure on margins. Expectations for 2H11 are largely consistent with current trends, with growth in Gases expected to moderate slightly and growth in Hardgoods expected to be very consistent.
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