For many of us it’s holiday time and thoughts run more to a nice sunny beach than to beech, but life goes on and trade has to continue, come rain or shine.
I’ve been away for a couple of weeks, enjoying the sights of the Far East, revisiting some of the places that I was fortunate enough to see during business travel many years ago. As some of the more hardened readers may remember, this can cause trouble in the Fryer household, as I’m usually reminded that holidays are not intended to be work under another guise. This time I was fairly well behaved!
What’s clear from speaking to people out there, particularly from Malaysia where timber is still a major part of their economy, is that the market slump of 1997 has been resolved, with a renewed confidence in their own ability to grow their industry. There are huge building programmes in place and some astonishing ‘trophy’ structures dotted all over the place, including the world’s largest building, the Petronas Towers. Let’s hope that the recent share value slide will not stem their renewed progress.
This all seems to show that, no matter what the business environment is like, trading life goes on and we have to do our best to fight for our share.
This brings me to the point I wanted to make, which is that, as John Park mentioned in his recent letter (TTJ May 4), it’s up to us to get our message across, particularly when competitors are queuing up to try to take back all that we’ve recently gained.
