As the HVAC industry comes out of its enforced COVID-19 hibernation and begins the journey of recovery, who is managing to buck the trend of decline?
Trusted industry voice HARDI (Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International) have compiled data from across the U.S. to view the big picture of the HVAC sector recovery post-COVID. The resulting data shows a steady decline in growth across usually prosperous months, resulting in an average sales growth of just 0.4% for May 2019/2020.
Green shoots of recovery.
Despite the sustained slowdown in growth, many HVACR news outlets are reporting green shoots with contractors getting back on site, the reopening of offices generating work, and continued HVACR upgrades across the network.
Employment figures across the U.S. are improving slowly with 4.8 million of those laid off due to COVID-19 being rehired. However, the unemployment percentage is still at a depression-era level with consumer confidence low and the risk of a second spike putting the brakes on a faster recovery.
However, research agency Globe Newswire continue to predict a return to sector growth with a CAGR of 12.2% over 2019-2026, citing the COVID-19 lockdown to be a short-term interruption to growth rather than a sustained problem. According to Business Wire, the scale of the impact may be a 2-3% growth slow-down on pre-COVID predictions.
The sales-i advantage.
Whilst the figures from HARDI show a slowdown in annual growth to just 0.4% in May 2020, the pattern of sales follows a similar seasonal fluctuation across comparable years, just at a much-reduced rate for 2020. We can assume from this that the seasonal demands within the sector are still driving buying patterns despite the COVID lockdown.
However, when comparing data from sales-i HVACR users across the same period, the speed of recovery is outperforming the industry averages by a significant 20 points.
Whilst a multitude of factors will be at play, such as the specific products, sector sub-categories, existing contracted work, and so on, the increase is big enough to raise the question – what are they doing with sales-i that is helping them buck the trend of decline?
Kickstart your return to business.
To enable your business to lead the charge to recovery in the coming months, your team will have to be proactive and seize every opportunity. This may be taking a moment to review current processes, reskilling your team, or investing in a new technology to streamline operations.
sales-i offers your business actionable insights, cross-sell and upsell alerts, and a mobile-enabled CRM that keeps all of your team connected, anytime, anywhere. Seamless integration with your back-office data, project calendars, and additional power user controls means you can track, review, and refine every action your business makes to boost the bottom line.
Contact our team to discover more or book your demo online.
