Hicksville, N.Y.—Due to the rising cost of raw materials combined with other factors, two of the resilient segment’s major players will be increasing their prices. In a memo sent to its customers, Congoleum Corp. announced, effective with shipments beginning Sept. 1, prices on all its products will increase. The prices on all products in the Designer Inlaid, Ultima and Florever lines will be raised 5%, while all other products, including installation and maintenance products, as well as the new Pacesetter and DuraCeramic collections, will receive a price hike of 3%. Any orders placed by Aug. 22 calling for immediate shipment will be billed at current pricing. According to the memo, the increase is necessitated by significant increases in: • Key raw materials, such as vinyl resins and plasticizers; • Energy, in particular, natur al gas; • Property, casualty and health insurance costs, and • Transportation.

“While we have made significant strides in minimizing the impact of previous increases by improving our efficiencies,” said Dennis Jarosz, Congoleum’s senior vice president of marketing. “We can no longer absorb increases in our costs without passing a portion on in the cost of materials we sell. Every which way, whether it be health, property and casualty insurance, raw materials and utilities, they’ve all been escalating.” Jan Lembregts, president of Domco Tarkett Residential, told FCNews that, as of Aug. 1, the company had also instituted a price increase. “With the [higher] raw materials costs, as well as an increase in the cost of energy, we are supporting a price increase.” He noted the increase will affect the company’s sheet vinyl products in the mid- to high-end price points, and that “it will be around 5%.” On the commercial side, Gilles de Beaumont, president of Domco Tarkett Commercial, said, “We believe the continued increase in the cost of raw materials will force us to raise our prices between 3% and 6%. All products will be affected from the standard to the premium collections. “For months we have been pushing our manufacturing efficiency performance to the limit to minimize the raw material affect on our cost,” he explained. “We were hoping that after the war with Iraq we would see some relief but it did not happen. Most likely, we will have no choice but to pass those increases to the next level.”

The two other major companies of the segment, Armstrong World Industries and Mannington Mills said they would not be raising prices at the present time. “We have not announced an across the board price increase at this point,” said Roger Oates, Armstrong’s vice president of marketing. “We review pricing in every market our products go almost on a weekly basis, but we haven’t officially announced any price increase at this point.” “We are not having any price increase at this time,” said Kim Holm, president of residential business for Mannington Mills. “The first half of the year has been a little disappointing from a sales standpoint, primarily at retail, and, although we have had a lot of cost pressure on our product lines, specifically the vinyl category, we don’t think the time is appropriate to try and pass through a price increase. “Rather than go with an increase,” he concluded, “we just think we need to see a little more strength in the market before we feel we can feel comfortable to pass it through and make sure that it holds. We have seen the business improve over the last couple months and we hope to see a continued improvement. We anticipate that it will improve but we just don’t feel the market is strong enough today to try to pass that through.”