ED[lIORIAL

New contenders for old crowns

llt HEN 1992 concludes, it may eam the title: Ul Year of the Substitutes. It may also be the first of many years when comfortable purchasing patterns are replaced with a scramble to get something at any price just to complete the order.

Ducking and weaving to avoid the body blows by environmentalists to raw material supply, wood products buyers are increasingly using fancy footwork to meet their customers' needs.

Old distribution pattems are undergoing radical changes. Southem yellow pine no longer stays below the Mason-Dixon Line. In the past two years SYP has made inroads on the Pacific Coast, following the lead of the southern yellow pine plywood that preceded it about 10 years ago.

In hardwoods, meranti, for example, is filling in for lauan in some applications as crimped sources of supply have changed availability. Reports indicate that old favorite red oak, once in plentiful supply, is no longer as readily available, resulting

DAVID CUTLER editor- publisher

in abrupt shifts in purchasing as buyers seek suitable replacements. Melamine now routinely fills in for some scarce and/or expensive hardwoods. Some foresee designers specifying it, fearful that the hardwood they prefer won't be available at any price.

Moulding and millwork operations are increasingly using radiata pine from Chile and especially New Zealand as domestic pine vanishes behind a curtain of land lockups inspired by preservationist efforts. Douglas fir is as vulnerable as pine to the wilderness hysteria, so we may well see far more wood from Canada this year than in any year in the recent past. Countervailing duty headaches or not.

Steel, aluminum, concrete, masonry, plastic and other wood substitutes stand eagerly by the ring, ready to jump in and fight to fill the void. No one product is going to win by a knockout, but the brawl is likely to go the full 15 rounds.

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