The great patio furniture shortage

11 July 2021, 06:41 PM

quote:
People used to go to Valley View Farms to buy five tomato plants and end up with $5,000 in patio furniture.

This year is different. After a record burst of sales in March, the showroom floor is almost empty of outdoor chairs, tables and chaises for people to buy.

The garden supply store in suburban Baltimore has been waiting six months for a shipping container from Vietnam full of $100,000 worth of wicker and aluminum furniture. Half of the container has already been sold by showing customers photographs. The container should have arrived in February, but it reached U.S. waters on June 3 and has just docked in Long Beach, California.

“Everyone is just so far behind,” said John Hessler, 62, the patio section manager. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

The Biden economy faces the unusual challenge of possibly being too strong for its own good.

There is the paradox of the fastest growth in generations at more than 6% yet also persistent delays for anyone trying to buy furniture, autos and a wide mix of other goods. It’s almost the mirror opposite of the recovery from the Great Recession of 2007-2009, which was marred by slow growth but also the near-instant delivery of almost every imaginable product.

What ultimately matters is that demand stay strong enough for companies to catch up and shorten the long waits.

“This is a very good problem for the economy to have,” said Gus Faucher, chief economist for PNC Financial Services. “You’re much better off having too much demand than too little, because too little demand is the recipe for an extended recession.”

https://apnews.com/article/hea...b07dd927778fb7944c3a

11 July 2021, 06:54 PM

ShiroKuro

No, I did not think the title of this thread was "The great piano furniture shortage," why do you ask?

In other news:

quote:
People used to go to Valley View Farms to buy five tomato plants and end up with $5,000 in patio furniture.

(sorry, I can't imagine spending $5000 on patio furniture...)

Back to the topic at hand... my mother has been waiting forever to receive delivery of a sofa she ordered....

11 July 2021, 06:54 PM

Steve Miller

I just read where Ford has started receiving chips to put in the thousands of partially completed trucks they have been storing.

I expect to see the price of trucks - especially used trucks - drop substantially.

11 July 2021, 07:07 PM

jon-nyc

Rachel ordered new patio furniture in May. It’ll be here in August and September. And it was ridiculously expensive. Like 7k or a bit more.

11 July 2021, 07:09 PM

ShiroKuro

Ugh.... I think I posted a while back that we are considering getting a new car... I have been putting it off while we take care of a few other things around the house, and I was thinking we'd start car shopping this month.

But I don't know if I'm up for car shopping in a shortage. Ugh.

12 July 2021, 01:17 AM

RealPlayer

There’s a patio furniture store called Fortunoff’s in the NYC area. I am not at all surprised to see prices in the several thousands. I assume their stuff is better than the cheap stuff.

12 July 2021, 05:58 AM

jon-nyc

Rachel did advertising for them many moons ago, specifically for their wedding/engagement jewelry.

One add showed Dr Ruth Westheimer in a wedding gown. They tried to get Former mayor Koch but he wouldn’t do it. Wear a bridal gown that is.

Seems like a different Fortunoff though - this one was a jewelry store with a 5th Avenue flagship

12 July 2021, 08:52 AM

QuirtEvans

quote:
Originally posted by jon-nyc:
Rachel did advertising for them many moons ago, specifically for their wedding/engagement jewelry.

One add showed Dr Ruth Westheimer in a wedding gown. They tried to get Former mayor Koch but he wouldn’t do it. Wear a bridal gown that is.

Seems like a different Fortunoff though - this one was a jewelry store with a 5th Avenue flagship

I remember that place. In my teenage years, I was up and down Fifth Avenue doing deliveries all the time.

12 July 2021, 09:54 PM

Nina

Patio furniture is insanely expensive. I don't really understand why. It's as expensive as "regular" furniture.

12 July 2021, 10:12 PM

Steve Miller

That is true if you buy the high-end stuff like Brown Jordan. We splurged on a Brown Jordan patio set back we first got married. It was insanely expensive but we figured it would last forever. It did not.

What has lasted forever is a cheap (Chinese?) patio set we got at Target maybe 20 years ago. It still looks good and we will probably be moving it to Ohio.

12 July 2021, 10:14 PM

BeeLady

Forget patio furniture, I am still waiting for a color matched case of caulk that was ordered in March!

My siding, window replacement project went on for 9 months, about the time we built a custom built home 30 years ago...sigh..

My contractor ran out so again ordered in March. I hedged my bets and ordered case from Lowes the first of June.

Last week I called the manufacturer..I was worried they didn't have any...

But no, she said they had it in stock..and "We have LOTS of orders!"...She found one that matched mine but with no eta....

Meanwhile I try to find a painter (who can presumably apply the caulk)...today was my 3rd no show...

12 July 2021, 10:15 PM

Steve Miller

Greg works for a company that makes packaging equipment, and most of his customers are furniture manufacturers in North Carolina and the Midwest. All of them are shut down because they cannot get foam. People like to blame the supply chain from China for this, but the fact is most foam for furniture does not come from China but instead comes from Louisiana and Texas.

Both were hit with the consequences of inadequate infrastructure over the last year and foam plants have yet to recover from either the freeze or the floods.

12 July 2021, 11:07 PM

wtg

Steve speaks sooth.

https://www.djournal.com/news/...9e-402547459147.html

13 July 2021, 12:56 AM

RealPlayer

As a side note, it seems some people don’t know that, if you live in a place with cold winters, you should bring your patio furniture indoors. Lasts a lot longer that way.

13 July 2021, 07:26 AM

dolmansaxlil

quote:
Originally posted by Steve Miller:
I just read where Ford has started receiving chips to put in the thousands of partially completed trucks they have been storing.

I expect to see the price of trucks - especially used trucks - drop substantially.

The local Chrysler assembly plant was shut down for weeks this spring because they couldn’t get chips. They reopened for a couple weeks and are now shut down again. Same reason.