Two major deals announced in two days--US LBM's acquisition of American Construction Source (ACS) and Builders FirstSource's purchase of the Phoenix area's Alliance Lumber group--have helped the two acquirers each jump a place on Webb Analytics' revised Construction Supply 150 list of top dealers.
US LBM's deal May 25 to acquire ACS, which recorded $703.2 million in sales last year, was enough by itself to nudge US LBM above 84 Lumber for ninth place on the revised CS150. Add to that US LBM's earlier purchase of Higginbotham Bros. ($130.9 million in sales last year) and US LBM crossed the $5 billion sales mark. US LBM also this year had acquired the five-unit Gilcrest/Jewett operation in Iowa and a small truss plant, Villaume Industries, near Minneapolis.
BFS has grown even faster, having completed its merger with BMC in early January, catapulting it to No. 3 from No. 5 on the revised Construction Supply 150 list. Then on May 6 it acquired the John's Lumber in the Detroit market, and it followed up on May 24 with an announcement that it was buying Alliance Lumber's multiple operations. John's recorded sales of $49 million last year while Alliance took in $330 million. Together with what BMC did in 2020, BFS' total rose to $13.15 billion.
Here's the revised list:
The Construction Supply 150, produced by Webb Analytics and published April 29, lists the performance in 2020 of 150 of the nation's biggest construction supply companies. Together, the group figure in roughly 82% of all retail sales of construction products in the U.S.
The official list is meant to be a snapshot of construction supply firms as of Dec. 31, 2020. But, naturally, businesses change all the time, particularly when they buy and sell companies. Thus, Webb Analytics attempts from time to time to recast the list of top dealers to show what their numbers would be like if their 2021 acquisitions had been in place as of year-end 2020. The list above is the latest example.
The entire CS150 is available for free at www.webb-analytics.com. This 40-page PDF breaks down the numbers to show the size and scale of the LBM's industry's subsegments, as well reveal important metrics that show how the industry has been performing amid the COVID pandemic and housing's surge. You'll see how sales differed in 2020 by company type, how many dealers manufacture components and install products, which types of software companies will buy next, what percentage of women and minorities work at LBM operations, and what dealers think about job prospects who use marijuana.