The scene at every last hd around

The inventory at the two HD's closest to me have 735 and 1035 tons.......

 

I've posted this spreadsheet before but, if you have EXCEL and you want to compare fuels this is a pretty good tool:

http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/heatcalc.xls

It allows you to adjust BTU content per unit, stove efficiency, and prices. For me it shows the break even with decent pellets at $300/ton to be about $2.60/gallon for oil.

KaptJaq

 

good information. But a bit scary until I adjusts the numbers. I just changed over from oil to propane. Had to because of space issues. But I bought my gas at $1.79 and the efficiency of my new heater is 95%. Still cost more, but not so shocking.

 

I don't know...I think it has worked pretty good up to this point so far..

 

That is a really good question....

In my very humble opinion, I think it has to do with some mills and retailers taking a slighly different approach than the last couple of years...so they don't get caught short as in years past.

I think the big boxes have started to bring in product earlier as have some dealers and we have also seen the buying start to happen probably a month before it normally has in the past. Maybe the fact that the boxes are only a few dollars less than what is considered better pellets at stove stores and such might be an issue...that is just a guess on that.

In our case, we have made a business decision to bring in more and are betting on as a cold winter as last year. More product and so far that has been the right move .....warm winter, we might have a deal come spring....cold winter...we will be just fine.

The volume that some of you see at the plant in Upton is not as large as some of the guesses I have heard, but what is important is that 85-86% of what you see is currently spoken for and just waiting to get trucks under it....so we certainly don't have this monster pile of unsold pellets sitting there.....Another thought would be....give the market 10 days of cool weather when you wake up in the morning and you will see some of those piles quickly get reduced.

Pretty much without exception, my dealers are busy and pellets coming into their yards are getting sold in prompt fashion....no huge rush, but very steady and constant nonetheless.

August was great and I see no reason why Sept thru the end of the year won't be either....

 

A true hog would never have to scream for them......

 

Make that 775 and 1056 this morning. That's right, keep em coming guys.

 

At a minimal 3 tons per household ...that's only 610 homes...that isn't a huge number ...maybe 2-3 weeks worth of inventory once things get rocking....I don't consider that excessive

Now if that number didn't change after 3 weeks worth of much cooler temps...then maybe we can read something into that...but it's way too early to think the sky is falling just yet...

 

Doug what confuses me is i drove by the upton plant daily until last year. I know go by probably weekly. I have never seen 1/10th of the pllets that have been sitting there lately. Why the big baglog if they are all sold and you are selling 100% more than last year.

 

What is confusing?.....we are stocking much more and selling much more at the same time....some customers want them this week, or next or at the end of the month...so they don't all ship at once...but we have more trucks going out week over week this time of year than say 3 months ago...we are down just over 15% from our peak inventory, so right now it's going out faster than we are replacing it...during May/July just the opposite was true...I think any supplier servicing NE this would be true for as well....especially if they sell to the boxes.

 

BBS's have gone up 40.00 in past 2 yrs and selling the same ashy pellets like stove chows that many of us paid 229.00 ton winter of 2013-14.. that is significant
and reason enough to shop around and maybe pay 30.00 more a ton for better pellets..[the cost of fancy starbucks coffee for a week..].. I know I bought Lignetics[green bags for
5.00 more a ton than HD are selling stove chows for right now...Also bought Lacretes for around 30..00 more than HD stuff.. no brainer I think..

 

What confuses me is that the past 3 years i have never seen that big of a build over spring and summer. In the past have you shutdown or have you massively ramped up this year. Would seem you would have had comparable buildups previous years, or maybe i have just missed it. Are you over 20k tons sitting outside. I am too lazy to calculate the area where pellets seem to be sitting and the. Covert it to tons.

 

I agree that Presto logs, AWF, and Blazers [all sold at HD Maybe 1 tractor trailer load each at best last year] are not the BBS Norm...
if they sold those pellets on a regular rotation like the ashy stuff, it would be a no brainer to buy from the BBS's but they are not of the regular supply they get .. I mean who wants to wait till maybe december/January hoping that they get the good stuff in?
last winter HD here outside Phila got 1- 22 ton shipment of Blazers late December. and 1 same shipment of AWF's... too chancey to wait it out for many of us if we need 3-4 tons or more.

 

Don't think you are appreciating the magnitude of the increased volume we are seeing here. To call it "a lot more" would be an understatement. We are seeing store inventories 5x - 10x more than they have ever been before. It's like all the stores at the same time suddenly realized the lost revenue opportunity they where suffering by running out of pellets, and decided to throw the supply/demand inventory rulebook out the window and just order a gazillion tons. Well, I sure hope for their sake it's a cold one this year. Regarding Upton - you said that you are not the only distributor pushing product through there. Considering the dramatic increase of product that has been witnessed sitting around over there this year, perhaps it explained by the other vendors that are using the same facility.

 

Boxes here were swimming in AWF-WP last year. Excellent pellet.

 

Lignetics are sold at both pellet stores and TSC stores around here. The pellet stores that carry them are generally the small mom and pop shops as well as Ace, True Value, or Aubuchons. They run in the $300 range. At TSC, they are sold in either traditional Lignetics bags or TSC bags for $250/ton during the early buy or any given 10% off sale, which they seem to be having more and more frequently these days. Same situation with Stove Chow. The pellet stores sell them for > $300 per ton as Energex American, while TSC sells them in their brand bags for $250/ton during early buy or 10% off. I've noticed this year there seems to be decreased quantities of Energex varieties and quantities at the pellet stores, curious if they sold the majority of their supply to boxes instead? Anyway, ash volume doesn't bother me, because the stove has an ash pan the size of a dump truck. Heavy ash that stays in the pot and needs frequent tending to, well those simply get burned on the weekend when I'm around to scrape it more often. I have no qualms about scraping the pot more frequently if it saves me $50/ton.

 

I would sure hope so.

Dan