LUMBER

handle it differently. They sell. They sell product, themselves and their value-added services. In the end, they don't just survive, they thrive. No clearer evidence can be found than the growing-yes, growing-market share of the wholesale lumber community.

So with growing market share and a positive attitude, I would say that the "good times" we have been experiencing will last indefinitely. But the world is becoming more complex. Rapidly emerging technological "solutions" actually look more like problems. Lumber wholesalers will be responding in classic form with new ways to grow market share. For starters, an already healthy appetite for education is growing to new levels. To use the new tools coming available, wholesalers will seek out training to use those tools to maximum efficiency.

The new tools I am alluding to are technologicallybased, and it is technology that will help to smooth out the traditional cyclical swings in the general economy and in our industry sector. As for the good times, we haven't seen anything yet. And with our new tools, training and a can do attitude, great excitement lies ahead.

Virtually everyone reading this magazine is somewhere in the U.S. or Canada. We think in terms of North America, which holds only 5Vo of the world's 6 billion people. Talk about opportunity and cause for optimism! The world's economies are growing stronger and those of us in the wholesale sector see limitless possibilities. We are in a global economy now and there is no turning back. Billions and billions of people will be striving to improve their living conditions, and the renewable resources produced by the forest products industry and sold by NAWLA members will be a popular solution.