CEMA reports booked orders for April 2014 down 19.5% from April 2013

The Conveyor Equipment Manufacturers Association (CEMA) reported that its April 2014 booked orders decreased 19.5% when compared to April 2013 orders.

Bob Reinfried, executive vice president of CEMA, said in a recent interview that the April figures are a blip and follow tremendous order intake in the first four months of the year.

“We all knew that pace couldn’t continue,” he said, “but orders still outpaced shipments for the first four months. We expected this and expect orders to come increase a bit next month.”

April 2014 booked orders when compared to March 2014 booked orders were down 21.3%. April booked orders were down 0.3% for bulk handling Equipment and down 31.4% for unit handling equipment—which Reinfried called a driving force of a large part of what CEMA reports—when compared to March.

CEMA’s April 2014 billed sales (shipments) increased by 4.8% when compared to April 2013 sales. April 2014 billed sales when compared to March 2014 billed sales were up 7.8%. April billed sales were down 3.2% for bulk handling equipment and up 15.8% for unit handling equipment when compared to March.