Content about Florida

May 6, 2013
Data dive in Orlando

April 22, 2013
Looking ahead to modest growth

The Home Improvement Research Institute’s Spring Conference in Orlando, Fla., included a mixed message for future home improvement spending.

April 9, 2013
HIRI Spring Conference set for April 17

The series of presentations in Orlando, Fla., promises “New Approaches for Deep Insights into Home Improvement.”

March 25, 2013
Kimal Lumber feels a recovery

An article in Florida’s Business Observer documents the return to profitability of Kimal Lumber. It wasn’t easy.

February 26, 2013
HIRI tackles new approaches and deep insights

The Home Improvement Research Institute is preparing for its April 17 Spring Conference in Orlando, Fla.

February 21, 2013
Luxury finds its way back home

The nation's single-family housing market is springing back to life, and the luxury market is budding right along with it.

Luxury homes have received a healthy boost from historically low mortgage rates, increased buyer confidence and burgeoning interest from foreign investors looking to capitalize on favorable exchange rates.

One bellwether of the recovery: Toll Brothers, the largest luxury home builder in the United States, reported that fourth-quarter revenues (ended Oct. 31, 2012) were up 48%, and new orders were the highest level seen since 2006.

February 8, 2013
Free heaters? In Florida, incentives add up

New incentives for high-efficiency water heaters mean Orlando, Fla., consumers pay “next to nothing,” according to GE.

January 23, 2013
Builders’ Show to co-locate with KBIS

The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) and the National Kitchen & Bath Association (NKBA) signed a deal to co-locate the International Builders’ Show (IBS) and the Kitchen & Bath Industry Show (KBIS) in Las Vegas beginning in February 2014.

December 28, 2012
STAFDA president promotes new-product vigilance

There were several highlights to the STAFDA Convention & Trade Show in Orlando, Fla. Chief among them, according to the group’s president: scouting for new products.

In the most recent STAFDA Trade News newsletter, Rick Lamb of Frank’s Supply Co. in Albuquerque, N.M., described the hunt for new products as a crucial element of the trade show experience. 

December 17, 2012
Lighting Science names new CEO

Satellite Beach, Fla.-based Lighting Science Group Corp. named Jeremy Cage as CEO, effective Jan. 2. 

Cage replaces Brad Knight, who served as interim CEO while the board worked with an executive search firm, and who will continue to serve as COO of the company that designs, develops, manufactures and markets LED lighting solutions.

December 5, 2012
Former FBMA head forms consulting company

Bill Tucker, former president of the Florida Building Material Association and his wife Terri, previously CFO of Ro-Mac Lumber and Supply, have formed E to the Third Power Consulting -- e3 Consulting. 

Based in Leesburg, Fla., the company will offer leadership training as well as CFO-level services to companies unable to afford a full-time CFO. “E to the third power refers to the three E’s we bring to our clients: experience, expertise and empathy," said Bill Tucker.

November 15, 2012
Ogden, Utah, leads rise in housing affordability

Although home prices are starting to inch up in metro areas around the country, lower interest rates continue to make homes more affordable to median-income families, according to the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index (HOI).

November 2, 2012
One-on-one with STAFDA executive director Georgia Foley

Georgia Foley has been the executive director of the Specialty Tools & Fasteners Distributors Association (STAFDA) since 2000, but her involvement with the trade organization dates to when she was barely a teenager, when she helped her father — founder Morrie Halvorsen — run the operation out of the family basement.

Through the years, Foley has seen membership grow in numbers and stature even though STAFDA has maintained the same dues rates it first established in 1977.

November 2, 2012
STAFDA gets down to business

Some things will never change. There will always be a need for professionals to meet face-to-face and share experiences.

There will be plenty of that during the Nov. 4 to 6 STAFDA Convention & Trade Show at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla.

Of course, some things change all the time — products, customers, business and communications among them. And the group’s 36th annual event offers a lineup of updates, workshops and presentations that address those moving targets.

October 8, 2012
Florida hardware store closing after six decades

Knotts Hardware, a Tampa, Fla., area hardware store, shut down for good on Oct. 12, according to an article in The Tampa Tribune. Johnny Knotts, whose grandfather Ben founded the store in the 1950s, blamed a poor economy, competition from home improvement chain stores and declining commercial accounts.

September 4, 2012
American Builders Supply adds two veteran execs

American Builders Supply (ABS), one of the largest independent suppliers of doors, windows and trusses to home builders in Florida, has added two industry executives from ProBuild, 84 Lumber and HD Supply to its ranks. Both will report to CEO Bill Myrick at ABS's Sanford, Fla., headquarters. 

August 29, 2012
HIRI takes the industry’s pulse

Since the beginning of the economic downturn, forecasts on housing starts, real estate sales and remodeling have gathered like a convention of fortune tellers. But only one crystal ball is focused solely on the home improvement industry and how consumers are spending — or not spending — money on their homes.

August 23, 2012
Weather Trends retail forecast

Temperatures in September 2012 will continue to trend above normal across much of the nation. However, year-over-year warmer trends will be reserved to the Midwest states and the Mississippi and Tennessee River Valleys. Cooler weather will encompass the Northeast and much of the West, which will elicit demand for more of a seasonal-type product mix than last year.

August 21, 2012
DG Hardware acquires three Florida units

DG Hardware, a Sarasota, Fla.-based chain of 11 Ace stores, has purchased the Flager Ace Hardware chain for an undisclosed sum, according to an article in the Daytona Beach News Journal. Two of the acquired units are located in Palm Coast, Fla., and the third in Bunnell, Fla.

August 15, 2012
Builder confidence continues to improve in August

Builder confidence in the market for newly built, single-family homes rose two points for August  on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). This is the fourth consecutive month of improvement, and brings the HMI to its highest point -- 37 -- since February 2007.

August 15, 2012
New cash mob destination: Crowder Bros. Ace Hardware

A cab mob has hit another hardware store — this time Crowder Bros. Ace Hardware in Lakeland, Fla., according to an article in The Ledger. The hardware store had been hurting from the weak economy. 

August 1, 2012
Florida: Has the tide turned in the Sunshine State?

Housing economists, reading the tea leaves of recent building permits and home sales, are not yet ready to say, “It’s over.” But certain states are definitely showing a pick-up in business at both the builder and LBM supplier level. They say one of these states, surprisingly, is Florida.

July 30, 2012
From a Tampa garage, a green product goes national

Tampa, Fla.-based entrepreneur John Wink, of Novel Ideas, has announced the national launch of EcoBorder, an environmentally friendly landscape product.

Manufactured in the United States and molded from recycled tire rubber, this landscape edging was invented in 15-year landscape Wink’s garage, after his position with Merrill Lynch ended about the time of the 2008 stock market crash. With 15 years of experience in landscaping, he invented EcoBorder out of his garage in 2009.

July 30, 2012
Life’s a beach? For $19 million it is

The No. 1 ranked beach house in the United States -- according to a real estate website -- is a modern-style Montauk, N.Y., home with a price tag in excess of $19 million.

The house topped the list put out by TopTenRealEstateDeals.com, which ranked the Top 10 Coolest Beach Homes for 2012.

July 30, 2012
Life’s a beach? For $19 million it is

The No. 1 ranked beach house in the United States -- according to a real estate website -- is a modern-style Montauk, N.Y., home with a price tag in excess of $19 million.

The house topped the list put out by TopTenRealEstateDeals.com, which ranked the Top 10 Coolest Beach Homes for 2012.

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