Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief, Panel World July 2023

As has often been the case in my previous trips there, perhaps the leading topic of conversation at the Ligna show in Hannover, Germany in mid-May was the status of multiple new projects back in the United States, such as Roseburg’s new MDF plant in Oregon, Kronospan’s new OSB plant in Alabama, Hood Industries’ new softwood plywood mill in Mississippi and the discussion landed on some rumors that had been percolating.

I ran into a friend from the U.S. who is, how I can put this, “involved” in the panel industry. This person asked me if I had heard that Huber had selected a new location to build its next OSB facility. I told this person I hadn’t heard and asked where it was. “I can’t tell you,” this person answered. “Why not?” I asked. “Because the person who told me swore me to secrecy,” this person said. “I shouldn’t have even told you they had selected a location.” We laughed at the exchange. I mean, why not tell your most confidential information to the editor of a panel industry magazine?

“What letter does the state start with?” I asked with a chuckle. This person thought a moment, “Okay, it’s M.” In grade school I had learned a song in which you sang the names of the states in alphabetical order. “Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas…” It was usually good for winning a beer in college when I pretended I didn’t know any such song but was just trying to recite the states in alphabetical order, purposefully stumbling over a state along the way as if I couldn’t quite remember it until miraculously coming up with it, much to the groans of my easily impressed peers.

My mind and memory quickly raced through the song: “Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska…”

It wouldn’t be Maine. Huber already had one there. Maryland, Massachusetts, nope. Michigan, possible, but unlikely. Minnesota, are you kidding me after what Huber just went through there? Mississippi, very possible, the state had come on like gangbusters with sawmills and plywood mills and apparently has timberland to spare. Missouri, negative. Montana, don’t think so.

“Mississippi,” I said. “Don’t say you heard it from me,” this person said. “I’ll never identify you,” I said, “except maybe by your initials…just kidding.”

Bernstein, Woodward and Watergate it wasn’t, but a couple of days later I did a Google search for Huber Mississippi. Lo and behold. There it was, not an official announcement from Huber, but a joint public notice from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Mississippi Dept. of Environmental Quality Control that Huber wanted to build an OSB plant in Shuqualak, Noxubee County, Mississippi, and the purpose of the public notice was to inform the public, I guess, that Huber wanted a permit in order to discharge fill material into some wetlands. It got much more specific than that, but my initial thought was didn’t Huber didn’t get enough of the wetlands thing during its effort to build an OSB plant in Minnesota before saying goodbye? I’m guessing the circumstances are much different this time.

I was able to pull together this information and get it on our news site online. About two weeks later, after I returned to the U.S. from Germany, Huber officially announced it was building its next OSB plant in Shuqualak, Miss. I owe my friend a beer.

Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief, Panel World May 2023

In May, I depart for my 17th consecutive Ligna in Hannover, Germany. If the pandemic hadn’t canceled the event in 2021, I suppose this would have been 18. Regardless, I’m sure by now you’re thinking this guy must be getting up in years.

I know there must be many other Americans who have a longer consecutive Ligna attendance streak than me. But I know of only one—Fred Kurpiel, who is co-chairman with me of the PELICE event held in the off-Ligna year, and who had stints with Siempelkamp and Imeas in addition to his long-ongoing academic and consulting work.

I also know of one person who also will be attending his 17th Ligna in a row—Cole Martin, sales manager at Dieffenbacher. In fact, Cole and I attended our first Ligna in 1989, and we met there when he was a product manager for Küsters and I was headstrong into moving Panel World onto the international stage. I remember the exact moment I met Cole on the Ligna floor, and we discovered we had each graduated from Auburn University— Cole in 1976 and me in 1977.

Looking back, it’s not surprising that I met Cole at Ligna in 1989, because I was making the rounds of all the continuous press manufacturers at the time. Continuous presses were coming on strong in the composite board sector, and Küsters was a continuous press pioneer, and at that Ligna it was emphasizing its new profile control system on its twofold design continuous press.

Siempelkamp made no bones about its priority at Ligna ’89, considering the theme of its display was “Continuous Pressing with Siempelkamp ContiRoll.” At least a dozen were in operation worldwide by then, including several at Louisiana-Pacific facilities in the U.S. A few years earlier, LP kingpin Harry Merlo had said to me of the continuous press, “It’s the thing of the future.”

Speaking of continuous presses, a lot of people at Ligna ’89 were speaking of the Bison Hydro-Dyn continuous press, and in particular about two of them nearing installment in the U.S. at a new particleboard plant in Mt. Jewett, Pa. called Allegheny Particleboard, the brainchild of forest products physicist Volker Stockmann, who almost brought in Weyerhaeuser as his partner, before that fell through, leading to General Electric as a major investor.

But by no means was my first Ligna only about continuous presses. Remember the spindleless veneer lathe? Raute had fine-tuned it enough by then to display and operate a 5 ft. production lathe on the show floor. It drew massive crowds.

I could go on and on, which back then Ligna seemed to do, while the late international sales rep for Panel World, Alan Brett, showed me the ropes. We didn’t have a booth for many Lignas, so we put on a lot of miles, during and after the show. Today, and for many of the previous Lignas, Alan’s son, Murray, and I have worked out of our booth, while Murray’s wife, Liz, has handled the booth duty.

We all hope to see you there.

Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief, Panel World January 2023

Some forecasts coming out of APA—The Engineered Wood Association annual meeting in October painted a rather bleak economics picture for 2023. It was no surprise, given the already downward trending in housing starts, the steady upticking in interest rates and the gradual decline in many panel prices toward pre-pandemic levels. Though a couple of attendees mentioned to me that they thought the outlooks came across a little too negatively. “We aren’t there yet,” a producer executive said to me. “We’re doing okay at the moment.”

But barring the unforeseen, 2023 stands to be a challenging year, with some producers weighing production reductions while mill expansions still wrestle with supply chain issues and for that matter decide they aren’t in a hurry anyway.

No doubt many operations are already catching their breath following the tremendous post-pandemic surge. Now it becomes a matter of tweaking and timing.

A soft market is a good time to assess how the operation and mill fared through the hard run during the up market. Certainly through good times or bad most operations have systems and programming, and human beings, in place to provide immediate data feedback, but there’s nothing like a deliberate analysis, the results of which can range from everything to the need for a piece of equipment, to updating systems, to adding QC personnel, to simply a new paint job.

As you take a deep breath is also a good time to analyze where your company or operation is culturally. Running flat out 24 hours a day can push cultural principles (except for safety we would hope) to the side, though ideally the perfect operation is one that can blend seamlessly full production and the cultural personality, or mission statement, you’ve defined for it.

Did your operation’s cultural goals or principles live up to themselves during the production boom? If not, what do you need to do to solidify or enhance them? While your mill is not pushing production is a perfect opportunity to refurbish your cultural identity, perhaps even reevaluate it and establish new parameters for it; or, if you haven’t already done so, start from scratch to being to implement a cultural spirit.

Before we know it, we assume anyway, the building products markets will rebound and the industry will be producing at Indy 500 speed once again; so now is the time to get everything in order in time to make the green flag and to be able to coast through the yellow flags and to be satisfied with how you’ve performed come the next checkered flag.

Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief, Panel World November 2022

As I glanced through the pages of the six issues of Panel World in 2022, various news developments refreshed my memory, but underlying it all was just the fact that business for the most part was conducted as usual. That we were back to at least fairly normal hit home at the biennial PELICE in March in Atlanta, where the crowd was obviously enthusiastic to be back in the mainstream. Other events throughout the year proved it as well—from annual meetings to trade shows, and also because our editors were being welcomed back into the mills to work up articles. During the pandemic, we pieced together one article “virtually,” but it wasn’t nearly as good and detailed as doing it on site.

Here are some news items from 2022, in case you forgot:

—One Sky Forest Products said it would locate a new OSB plant in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan.

—A middle market private equity firm, One Equity Partners, purchased USNR.

—Several wood-based panel industry veterans came out against paperboard wall sheathing and its potential dangers during major storms.

—West Fraser purchased the idled OSB plant in Allendale, SC from Georgia- Pacific.

—GP announced plans to expand production capacity at its OSB plant in Alcolu, SC.

—Huber submitted a revised Environmental Assessment Worksheet to the city of Cohasset, Minn. regarding its proposed OSB plant.

—One Equity Partners equity firm purchased Oregon-based Rosboro.

—Tor Gustavsen, former managing director of Argos Solutions, died at 60.

—Eight keynote speakers, more than 50 presenters, 100 exhibitors and 450 participants made the eighth Panel & Engineered Lumber International Conference & Expo in Atlanta one of the best ever.

—Freres Lumber of Lyons, Ore. changed its name to Freres Engineered Wood as part of its centennial celebration.

—Boise Cascade acquired Coastal Plywood and its plywood mills at Havana, Fla. and Chapman, Ala. for $512 million.

—A Quebec-based forestry family— the Cossette family—said it is investing $180 million to restart the OSB plant at Wawa, Ontario.

—Scotch Plywood started producing veneer at its new facility in Waynesboro, Miss., after a fire had destroyed the existing one in early 2021.

—Raute named Mika Saariaho as president and CEO.

—LP converted its mill in Houlton, Maine to siding production.

—Pacific Woodtech acquired LP’s EWP division and three LVL/I-joist manufacturing facilities for $210 million.

—George Weyerhaeuser Sr., former president and CEO of Weyerhaeuser and great-grandson of the founder, died at 95.

—Collins named Tom Insko as president & CEO, succeeding retiring Eric Schooler.

—SmartLam announced plans to build a glulam facility in Dothan, Ala. to supply the mass timber industry.

—Siempelkamp named a new CEO and CFO, Martin Scherrer and Martin Sieringhaus, respectively.

—Construction continued at Martco’s new OSB plant in Corrigan, Texas, which will be the company’s second OSB mill at that site.