Plywood Industry Hears Talk of Upfurn for'61

\\ZESTERN PLY\ IOOD manufacYY turers, off the ropes after a yearlong pummeling from glutted markets and vanishing profit margins, are looking ahead with lighter hearts.

A rosy picture free of the black overtones of 1960 was painted at the 25th annual meeting of the Douglas Fir Plywood Association, which drew nearly 300 executives of member mills to Gearhart. Oregon.

The best housing year since 1950's record prosperity-with a prospect of even better things a year later-was forecast for 1961 by Carl T. Mitnick, past president of the National Association of Home Builders and one of the country's foremost builders.

A new DFPA-developed building system aimed at helping stabilize costs for material suppliers and builders was unveiled by Stanley A. Taylor, DF-PA field promotion director. Taylor also displayed the first results of a longrange research project aimed at producing permanent, factory-applied coatings designed for interior and exterior walls and roof surfaces.

A prediction that "all progress in building will come in the field of components," along with a statement that DFPA "is far in front ir-r the com- pollent field," came from James M. Lange, vice president and editor of Practical Brrilder magazine.

Big Year Forecast

Outgoing DFPA President C. Henry Bacon Jr., executive vice president of the Simpson Timber Co., reminded the group that "the plywood inclustry is investing more than all the lumber associations of the west put together in creating demand for its products." But he also predicted that the industry would market 8.1 billion sq. ft. of plywood in 1961 and warned that two billion feet of excess capacitv still overharrgs the market.

Executive Vice President W. E. Difford offered the helo of the association's high-powered piomotion ability to the lumber industry "where it makes sense. We're not asking you to sell plywood," Difford said. "We'11 do that. But where we can work together, we'll do everything we can to sell western woods."

Housing lfpturn Seen

C)ther markets, old and new, got a going over in the three-day series of sessions at the ocean beach meeting, but light construction, plywood's num- ber one customer, came in for the most attention.

Nlitnick, whose accurate forecast of 1960's housing downturn drew hot criticism two years ago, praised the Kennedy administration's appointments in the housing field and supported efforts to cut interest rates and extend FHA mortgage terms to 40 years.

"When we build one house, 2l men go to work for a year," Mitnick said. "\\then we drop 300,000 units, like we did last year, 750,000 men are out of rvork. If high interest rates and unemployment are anti-inflationary, then I'm an inflationist.

"These things that are happening are going to give us a wonderful year in 1961. The industry will build about 1,375,000 units this year. But 1962 is going to be a banner year-maybe the best year we've ever had. I predict the housing industry will make 1.6 million starts in 1962."

Mitnick, of Collingswood, N. J., probably is the r.ratior.r's biggest builder of retirement housing orrtside the sun belt. For this soecialized market he forecast 250,000 itarts in 1961.

Big Retirement Market

"The olvwood association has done a tremendbus favor to my industry by really rvaking the country up to this market," he said. "Nearly 35 per cent of American families consist of two people-two adults. Most of this group has seen its children grow up and move away from the family home. This is our market."

N{itnick said House of Freedom, the plywood industry's retirement demonstration house, "is a revelation to me. This is tl-re first successful industry house, and I've seen a lot of them.

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