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From Home Furnishing Business
Smith Leonard PLLC Shares February Industry Insights
March 3,
2024 by HFBusiness Staff in Business Strategy, Industry 
Smith Leonard PLLC shares their Furniture Industry insights for February, signaling that economic indicators and company results are providing mixed results therefore expectations for 2024.
The report begins with a summary that dives further into monthly results of new orders, backlogs and shipments as well as deeper dives into national statistics and insights. Be sure to check out the entire report for the full report for all the details.
New orders rose 6% in December 2023 compared to December 2022, which marks the 8th straight month orders have grown over the prior year, but a cooling off from the double-digit percentages we’ve been seeing. For calendar 2023, new orders were up 5% over 2022, which were down (33)% from 2021.
Shipments in December 2023 were down (4)% from November 2023 and down (14)% from December 2022, which were up 3% from December 2021. For calendar 2023, shipments were down (17)% from 2022. So despite recent improvements in new orders, trends continue to be affected by many companies shipping from their historically high backlogs through much of 2022. Accordingly, December 2023 backlogs were down (5)% from November 2023 and down (33)% compared to December 2022.
Receivable levels were down (12)% from November 2023, reversing the apparent 5% timing difference increase from the prior month. Receivable levels were down (16)% from December 2022, which is materially in line with the year to date decline in shipments.
Inventories and employee levels are again in line with prior months, but down from December 2022, indicating that companies have substantially adjusted levels to match current operations.