coronavirus and the economy/ business

We have used up all our back log of business. May will probably be slow till people start driving again and hit the deer. End of May and June can be our busiest months some years at my collision shop.

I do home remodeling n San Diego County and have been swamped. Booked past the first of the year.

They are hoping for end of July for us in the TV Biz. If we can't get them to let us have 100 people on set to shoot a sitcom, SX isn't happening for a long while.

Disneyland/World just announced they aren't opening till at least Jan 2021. Not looking good for us race fans.

Our ag construction business hasn’t seen any effect yet (emphasis on yet). We tend to idle back during the winter months and have just now brought back in most of our guys from layoff. Planting is underway and early projections were for a near record planting this year. But ethanol plants are idling due to the low demand for fuel and some pork producers are looking to kill off their nursery pigs with the drop off in the restaurant demand so there may be fewer pigs needing feed. As a result this could reduce plantings. Fall delivery grain prices are pretty low currently although that could stimulate some sales for us as some may choose to build storage and carry it over for the rebound. As always, time will tell.

The virus has shut down another one of Smithfield’s (Chinese owned) pork processing plants near us; they had one in the Dakotas close down too. Workers at these places (mostly Hispanic) are starting to get hit by the virus and this may interrupt the meat supply chain. China’s a big consumer of pork and supplies much of the worlds heparin (used in all sorts of medical/surgical procedures) which is made from pig intestines. The slowdown of surgical procedures is probably helping reduce worldwide demand currently but there’s likely a large backlog developing of these procedures so when it’s cuts loose the demand may be great. The Chinese had a large die off of their own herds last year from swine flu so I’d imagine they may still be leaning heavily on their US facilities to meet their demand. They’re probably trying to secure it from other US sources now so US consumers may end up involved in a bidding war with China over pork.

The world’s hit the reset button but I’m not sure if it’s a soft one or hard one.

Since my other post at the beginning of this thread, we have invoiced more business in one month that I usually do in two. This mostly coming out of my plastic division. The C-store I mentioned earlier, we ended up outfitting all there stores in the entire state. And are now receiving RFQ's from large corporations to furnish their cubical farms with barriers. Not to mention every Tom, Dick & Harry inventor trying to cash in on the chaos.

It's kind of numbing though, I was able to catch a breather a couple days ago and reading about all the hardship and loses some people are having to endure, in some ways makes me feel a little guilty of the success I'm currently enjoying. And for the post's I'm reading on here, hang in there guys.

However that may be easing up before too long. Clear plastic sheet material supply's are beginning to dry up, with a projection of two months for manufacturers to supply more. In my opinion, it's not that they can't keep up with demand, it's the manufacturing pricks can't figure out a way to fleece us well enough for more profit. All products I deal in are petrochemical based, and with oil prices in the crapper it leaves them with fewer excuses as to why they need to raise pricing. But as always I'm sure they'll find a way.

When I sent out my monthly billing April first I had 4 people cancel service the next day. I went into semi panic mode figuring it was the beginning of the end. I mentioned "starting to circle the drain" in a post. Since then we've been doing ok. People are stuck at home and the pools are seeing more use than normal so so far it's been steady. On 2 out of the 4 that quit we came up with a "diy pool service" plan for them. We sold them test strips and enough chemicals to last a few weeks. They text me a picture of the test strip, and I text them back what to add. As long as their buying the chemicals from us, they get free advice, plus I figured it'd keep us in the loop when the equipment breaks and hopefully go back on regular service when / if they start working again. Plus I'm finding out after the first month that they're realizing how much physical work it is. I'm confident that if they get to the point to where they can afford the luxury of pool service again they won't call anyone else. They seem very thankful were willing to help them out with free tips and instructions. (We're only doing this for people who were on service with us before this, we're not taking any new diy pool service customers) The commercial accounts have never been easier, we're still maintaining them but the heaters are off and no ones swimming. I have 2 big condo accounts that are saying F-you gov't. our pools are staying heated and open, but they have big signs saying only 15 people in the whole pool area at a time. So knock on wood for now we're still working and paying our bills. I'm nervous what will happen if the lockdown doesn't end in a couple months, people are thinking about their pools and are enthused about using them, but that will come to a screeching halt if this bullshit lasts beyond summer. So we're on the live cheap and save what we can plan

construction in Utah has boomed, we've (commercial glass) done almost double the contracted work as any year prior. actually we just hired another PM to help with the work-load in the office.

I averaged 30 hrs a week since returning to work in May.
A couple weeks ago, I started a fairly large project and was getting my 40. After snapping lines for saw cutting to do my plumbing install, I’ll be home a couple days while they do
their thing. We don’t have much work. My company only has two jobs we’re currently working on. I’m not sure what’s next. Hopefully we get other contracts lined up for the New Year. Kinda hit and miss unfortunately.

Hospitals still empty. Massive hour cuts. not hiring etc.

GP. Did you miss Republican/Democrat Gov. DeWine's conference today? He said Ohio is rona rona rona!! Hospitals are overrun and workers in medicine are all worn out from dealing with corona patients! He will be shutting this state down again in a week.

Stamp it!

I didn’t miss shit. Worn out ??? We can’t find hours to work.

Construction is boomin huge here in socal. This is by far the busiest I’ve ever been. I’m biddin shit ridiculously high on purpose and in return I get asked, “when can you start”. Crazy shit. Still feel like its all gonna catch up to us and we’ll be hurtin soon.

Autobody is on the climb. Our location still isn’t back to pre Covid numbers (And not sure it will ever be but that’s due to other circumstances as well) but thank god. Our shop used to be so busy you couldn’t get everything done if you worked 24/7. It’s actually quite nice. Full days work, big paychecks, but time to get everything you need to done!

I left the reefer trucking, very anti experience driver. I,m with a Bulgarian speaking, some Russians I think out of Chicago . Awesome people, I haul a lot of haz mat loads. On a run to Cali., have not been there since 08. I,m usually in NJ or Pa.. anyway since mid June trucking has been super busy. Rates are very high since mid June. So that’s good news.

Girl friend and her sister own a horse stable they have had for 15 years.

Lessons, boarding, leasing, parties and summer camps etc.

This year has been absolutely crazy. Every summer camp at max capacity. Every horse leased, and no room to add new boarders. With 3 full time instructors We have 40 people on a waiting lists to start lessons.

Between what she owns and boarders, we stay at 75-80 horses. We are trying to add horses but seasoned horses have become harder to find, and have at least doubled in price since march.

I have been as busy as I have ever been making improvements, building a new arena, fencing new paddocks, and shuffling stuff around to add room where ever we can.

We have an annual fund raising event for st jude's in october. In 2019 we raised a little over $9,000 which was the most ever, then.

This year, we were completely blown away by a final tally of over $26,000. Not intending to boast, just another indication of how crazy the year has been.

Trying to read tea leaves and crystal balls to predict how long it will last.

I got let go in late March from a major oil/gas company, I started doing hot-shot trucking and invited a bunch of laid-off oil workers to join in a few months later. Well, about 80,000 miles since then and 46 of the lower 48 since May 1st life on that front is good, and I just got the call back a few weeks ago to come back to the oil company for work.

The service industry as far as food etc is suffering, but it seems to me the rest of the blue-collar types are making a go out of it while white-collar types do Zoom meetings and wishing for the best. Just my observation.