The shipment of corrugated products continued to improve, with figures for October showing a 0.3 percent improvement from figures the same time last year. According to the Fibre Box Association, shipments for October stand at 34.868 billion square feet, compared to last year’s October figure of 34.777 billion square feet.
Despite the improvement over the past several months shipments of corrugated products still lag those from 2001. For the first 10 months of the year shipments stand at 319.530 billion square feet, a 0.5 percent dip from figures the same time last year.
Broken out by individual sectors, the Northeastern United States continues to be the weakest region of the country, with shipment down for both the month and year to date. For October, shipments from the Northeast are down 3.6 percent; for the first ten months shipments are off by 3.3 percent.
The strongest region of the country for the year and first 10 months is the East Central U.S. which posted a 3.2 percent improvement for October, as well as a 1.1 percent increase over the first 10 months of the year.
Along with an improvement in shipments of corrugated products, the consumption of containerboard posted a strong 2.8 percent increase for the month of October, compared to figures the same time last year. For October, consumption stands at 2.721 million tons, compared to last October’s figure of 2.648 million tons.
The improvement for the month pushed the ten-month consumption figure to 24.536 million tons, a 0.2 percent improvement from the same time last year.
While shipments and consumption both improved for October, the inventory of containerboard at domestic plants also increased by 0.2 percent from the previous month. The increase in inventory pushed the weeks of supply on hand to 4.1 weeks of supply, a 2.5 percent increase from end-of-September figures.