Monday Morning Monologue: Copper is down. Are you getting your decrease?
Good Morning!
Do you buy motors (copper windings), copper bent tubes, solenoids, brass castings, brass machinings, brass extrusions or any process/ material using copper?
Go get your price decrease!
The price of copper is down significantly over the last 9 months or so. It’s rebounded a bit of late, but still soft. Now is the time to be aggressive and get the cost savings.
We always get the increase letter when prices escalate, but seldom get the letter that prices have softened (perhaps once in every 3 or 4 increases).
Failing to capture on the downturns has an effect over time… but you may never notice. If you only adjust pricing when you receive a letter… what’s happened to your price? Up, up, up, down, up up…. When in reality it should be: up, down, up, up, down, down, up. You could have a large gap in what your material cost should be vs. what it actually is. Big, big opportunity.
Most manufacturers will agree to lock your price into a material pricing index. Please do this. It keeps your material price where it should be and now effort can be focused on how their processes can be made more efficient to reduce your cost instead of constantly negotiating material prices.
Have a great week!