January Trailer Orders Rise 18% to Near 30,000
New trailer orders rose 18% in January from a year ago to 29,853 units, ACT Research reported.
The total was the fifth highest in the past year, after December and October, which topped 40,000, and September and November, which topped 30,000.
“All in all, it was a pretty decent number for a January,” said Frank Maly, ACT’s director of commercial vehicle transportation analysis and research.
“It’s down from December, but the way things ended last year, you would kind of anticipate anything was going to be down from a very strong fourth quarter,” he said.
The industry’s backlog rose to 187,000 units — the highest level in about 20 years, Maly said.
Another group, FTR, reported a slightly lower total of 27,300 orders for January.
“The trailer market remains very vibrant,” said Don Ake, FTR’s vice president of commercial vehicles. “OEMs are finishing up filling third-quarter production [and] . . . fleets are optimistic about 2015.
“Cancellations were up, but that often happens at the beginning of the year when fleets take a closer look at their requirements,” Ake said. “With backlogs very high, order patterns should start to follow a more traditional pattern.”
