Resin Market
I fell asleep last night and dreamed about skiing down this mountain of resin. This beautiful abundance of resin that is supposed to be plentiful and bring prices down to more manageable realms for all of us. I thought of how my skis would get caught in the little pellets and how I would have to turn and stop, or fall into the inviting soft resin. However, it’s been as dry as the Sahara and the resin is “coming soon” to a mountain near you. I don’t know why there seems to be delays, I know that there seems to be a continued lack of supply in the market. However, pricing has shown some small movement as more resin poured into the spot market.
However, the nominated 3 cents is still on the table and force majeure on some resin grades continue with another firm proposing an increase of 4 cents for May. My crystal ball is saying it’s stable and the thought of higher pricing is pushed only to try to shore up any attempts at bringing down the market. However, there was some haziness in the crystal ball because I was eating a buttery biscuit while I was looking.
Paper Market
Judging by the fact that my box supplier has gone up 10% on me, we are able to say that these price increases are taking hold. I have been given no relief on the staged amount of $50.00 that was ours to devour, like a biscuit that’s too dry (see above about butter BOJANGLES), I didn’t want to eat it but I had to. Unfortunately, my palate is such that swallowing such large increases normally creates a gag reflex, as it does for all of you, and my potential for negotiating seems to go back to my days of when I was a young soldier, trying to ask for only 50 pushups and not the ordered 100 pushups. Let’s put it this way, I didn’t do 75, 80 or 99 pushups…………. My hope is some kind of stability in this market, but much of the push is coming from new regulations in China for less recycled material, stressing prices to move higher due to the greater demand. Coupled with talks again of more trade wars, this could get even pricier than one lonely NFL team for sale in Charlotte, NC.
Ron’s view:
I recently read The Everything Store by Brad Stone, which is about the amazing rise of Amazon. It was a look at Amazon and their unique rise to power and the obsessive drive of their founder, Jeff Bezos. Reading this book, which I recommend for anyone, I learned that like all companies, even as great as Amazon, that the rise to greatness is about vision and a whole lot of chaos. I think everyone has experienced this. Bezos was driven to create the ultimate Customer experience. I know after his purchase of Whole Foods, the automatic system in Amazon also suggested…….”You might also like, Michaels or Best Buy”.
However, my amazement was how Bezos was willing to scrap systems and create new ones from scratch, being accused of wasting billions because of it. He hired the distribution brains from Wal-mart and quickly realized that they were a totally different animal and that the system he had just invested billions in, was totally unacceptable to deliver his unyielding principal, and that was to deliver the ultimate customer experience. Bezos’ could see in the future and see where Amazon would be in 5 years, 10 years and 20 years down the road. If you asked me back in the 90’s, I was buying my books from Amazon all because it would be at my door in about 5 days and I hated shopping but loved books. Bookstores were typically in large shopping areas or malls, two places I tried to avoid, because of the parking and the easy access to Cinnabons. I would also buy my CDs that I would later load into my Sony digital player that could hold a whopping 30 songs and ran on 1 AAA battery, this is before Apple would reach me with a marvel called the iPod. I would show this little battery eater to everyone at the gym and laugh at their bulky CD players that they had strapped to their backs.
I never could see Amazon becoming the Everything Store, but Bezos could. One thing he also showed was his ability to push and he understood, it’s not just about the customer experience but it’s also tied into value. I know why we do what we do at Alliance Plastics, and I torture myself about if we are getting that message out. We are obsessively loyal, we don’t own a distributorship in Florida or other companies selling direct all while we tell everyone, “We are only selling to distributors.” We are true to our word that we only sell through distribution. Not one of my vendors can say that. Not one of my competitors can say that. We are a little different and quirky and we really try to change the industry. We also realize the need for value which is why Alliance Plastics has lowered our prices on core items that you need every day. We are bringing a market value proposition and giving Truckload pricing for small quantities to help you improve your cash flow, improve your costs and to help you improve your customer experience. We are going to showcase these items and while everyone is increasing their prices, we are going to lower these costs to you. It’s part of our inspiration to become the EVERYTHING PACKAGING Store and our own obsessive passion to deliver the ultimate customer experience to you.
We do the things we do because that is who we are.
We invent new concepts because we want to see change.
We are loyal because we choose to do the right thing.
That’s the Alliance Way.
While prices have gone up, Alliance has been pushing for lower costs to you. Check out the Aprils Savings, just in time for Spring. Give your customers products that will outlast the competition.
