In Monday's Kickstart, Don Loepp wrote about Berry Global Group Inc. and how its sales have boomed as consumer product demand (and packaging for those products) climbed during the pandemic.
Today, let's take a quick look at another industry seeing big numbers during the pandemic: composite decking.
Trex Co. Inc. reported Aug. 3 that its second-quarter sales climbed 7 percent to $221 million, driven by homeowners spending money on home improvement projects. The demand came as Trex brought on an expansion at Fernley, Nev., that has all three of its extrusion lines up and running, President and CEO Bryan Fairbanks said in a conference call. More extrusion of the plastic and lumber composite decking is set to come on line soon in Virginia, and Trex expects to find customers for that production as well.
"It's fair to say that the resilience of the Trex customer far surpassed our expectations at the beginning of the pandemic when we saw key states with major population centers shut down large portions of their economies," Fairbanks said.
That demand is echoed in Trex's stock price. Shares that started 2020 selling at about $90 were selling at more than $144 on Aug. 3. (And up from $63 in mid-March.) Thanks to the rising share price, Trex will have a two-for-one stock split next month.
Trex isn't alone. While we'll have to wait until Aug. 13 for numbers from Azek Co. Inc. — a Trex competitor — we can already see how well its stock has done since Azek went public in June. Shares that sold for $27.15 on June 12 opened at $34.08 on Aug. 4.