Quikrete Industry Dashboard & Retail sales

The latest version of the Quikrete Industry Dashboard brings mixed signals to bear on the performance of major industry metrics.

Sales for building material and garden equipment and supplies dealers (NAICS 444, which includes home centers and hardware stores) increased in December to an unadjusted $38.656 billion, up 11.7% from a year ago. Compared to November, however, NAICS 444 sales declined slightly.

Meanwhile, the subset of hardware stores, or NAICS 44413, were released for November, showing a 12.2% increase over a year ago, but no gain over October. 

Those sales trends were in line with the overall retail sales trends reported by the U.S. Census Bureau. The Friday report showed sales for December 2021, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were up 16.9% over the year, but down 1.9% compared to the prior month.