Latest from Mag

Plenty of executive appointments over the past two weeks. Here’s Electrical Marketing’s expanded coverage of personnel changes in the electrical market.
Dec. 21, 2012
Wire man John Pasqual and lighting rep Jack Melnick
Dec. 21, 2012
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Electrical product prices remained on their flat trend, showing no change from October and little change in almost all major product categories.
Dec. 21, 2012
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Privately-owned housing starts in November were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 861,000, 3% below the revised October estimate, but 21.6% above the Nov. 2011 rate.
Dec. 21, 2012
Veteran reps form new agency in Raleigh; WinWholesale buys Lloyd Graves in Texas; United Electric Supply expands through acquisition; and more.
Dec. 21, 2012
W.W. Grainger Inc., Lake Forest, Ill., announced plans to purchase Techni-Tool Inc., Worcester, Pa., a 200-plus employee distributor supplying customers in the cable television...
Dec. 21, 2012
Kaman Industrial Technologies (KIT), the industrial distribution business Kaman Corp., Bloomfield, Conn., has built up in recent acquisitions of Minarik, Zeller Electric and others...
Dec. 21, 2012
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg offered an update on the city’s plans to renovate its infrastructure to withstand future storms.
Dec. 7, 2012

Hubbell Reports Strong Fourth Quarter Results

Hubbell Inc., Orange, Conn., reported sales in fourth quarter 2004 at $499.7 million for a 12 percent increase over $444.7 million reported in the same period in 2003.
Jan. 28, 2005
2 min read

Hubbell Inc., Orange, Conn., reported sales in fourth quarter 2004 at $499.7 million for a 12 percent increase over $444.7 million reported in the same period in 2003.

The company said quarterly income grew to $47.8 million, a 37 percent increase over $34.8 million, a year ago.

Timothy H. Powers, chairman, president, and chief executive officer, said that while the company’s accomplishments throughout the year were exceptional, there were challenges.

“The year was challenging as well,” Powers said. “Especially so in materials cost. The rate of cost increases was unprecedented. Metals like steel, copper, and aluminum had successive escalations in cost throughout the year. Oil, which exceeded $50 per barrel at one point, impacted freight costs, feedstock for molding plastic parts, and the cost of heating our facilities. All impacted margins of businesses within the power systems and electrical segments which have a high metal content in their product lines.”

In the electrical segment, sales improved by 12 percent and operating profit was level with the prior year. Sales at the wiring systems operations improved modestly and profits were even with last year. Electrical products reported higher sales and operating profits, but margin declined in the quarter chiefly as a result of steel price increases. Steel is the primary component of many of this group’s products — Raco switch, junction, and outlet boxes, as examples — and the cost of steel continued to escalate. Price increases on these products were announced to recover higher steel costs, but the lag between announcement and implementation of the product price increase — typically a calendar quarter — impacted profitability in the final period of the year.