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How Lumber Looks
The lumber marker generally looks like it might take a definite turn for the better any day now.
Unsold stocks at the public docks at San Pedro reported last issue totaled 9r579rOOO f.eet. As this issue goes to priss the total is reduced to 811391000. Sixty-six vessels in the California service are laid up. The largest lumber carying California vessel, the Missoula, is in the Atlantic Coast trade for the time being.
Los Angeles building permits up to August 22nd, total f2r749r441. The total permits for July wete $317511072.
The last cargo arfival reports in this column were for the week ended August 8th. For the week ended August 15th the cargo arrivals in San Pedro were: 1O cargoes of Fir, 8r358rOOO Leet;2 cargoes Redwood, 8451000 feet; total for week was 9r 2O3rO00. For the week ended August 22nd, the totals were: 10 cargoes of Fir, 616811000 feet; 1 cargo Redwood, 400,000 feet; total 7,0E1,000 feet.
For the entire united States lumber producing industry lumber orders have forged slightly in the lead of production, due entirely to the gre dy decreased production.
The last report of the Vest Coast Lumberments Association at Seattle showed their mills to be operating 38.O2/s of capacity as compared with an avetage of 4l.3lVo of capacity
National City Bank Explains Increasing "Cost of Distribution"
In the August news letter of the National City Bank, of New York, the following on cost of distribution is splendidly stated, and of interest to all distributors: for the first seven months of this yeat, and with 59.80/s of capacity for the first seven months of 1930. This last report showed new business for the week to be about one per cent under production, with shipments 4/s above. For the entire year orders ate t.5/s above production, and shipmenb are 4.2/s above.
"Mu'ch comment upon distribution cost is made by persons who are fully acquainted with the conditions and risks involved, and who take the view that an unnecessary share of it is a kind of predatory toll exacted from the pioducer and consumer. The fact is that a rising cost of distribution is not. necessarily a measure of inefficiency of_ distribution agen,cies in any way, but may be simply an indication of the .increasing complexitv of the business and social organlzauon.
The last week reported by the Southern Pine Association showed orders 37/s above ptoduction, and shipments 39/s above. Yellow Pine production is now 54.44Vo below their tlreeye t a"vefage.
The Vestern Pine Manufacturers last weekly report showo sales and shipments both considerably below'prbduction
The California Vhite & Sugar Pine Manufacturers Association reports orders and shipments slighdy below production.
The Northern Pine Manufacturers Association, of Minneapolis, reports orders and shipments in excess of production.
The Flardwood Manufacturers Institute, of Memphis, sho-ns both otders and shipments to be far above production. So does the Northern Hemlock & Hardwood Manufacturers Association 1f oshkosh' visconsin'
Continually decreasing production marks the entiie lumber industry. No price improvements are reported in any district or from any species. Price improvements would, of coufse, follow fast on the heels of any definite increase in volume of consumption of lumber, since lumber stocks are at a very low ebb in ihe hands of distributors the country over.
"In the handcraft days when communities produced most of the things they used, the cost of distribution was negligible, but in the most efficient specialized' organization, which adds to the general wealth by increasing the quantity and variety of production, an involved interchange of goods is necessitated. Varied raw materials are brought together from distant points and redistributed in finished form over a greater area and the service of more labor and capital is required."
