Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey

Results Summary

Historical data are available from June 2004 to the most current release month.

*Shown is the number of consecutive months of expansion or contraction in the underlying indicator. Expansion is indicated by a positive index reading and denoted by a (+) in the table. Contraction is indicated by a negative index reading and denoted by a (–) in the table.

**Shown is the number of consecutive months of improvement or worsening in the underlying indicator. Improvement is indicated by a positive index reading and denoted by a (+) in the table. Worsening is indicated by a negative index reading and denoted by a (–) in the table.

†Added to survey in January 2018.

Data have been seasonally adjusted as necessary, with the exception of the outlook uncertainty index, which does not yet have a sufficiently long time series to test for seasonality.

Production Index

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Comments from Survey Respondents

These comments are from respondents’ completed surveys and have been edited for publication.

• The change of administration and negative bent toward the oil and gas industry are issues affecting our business.
• Right now, some answers are probably skewed with the issues of the winter storm. Our facility is completely shut down, and we’ll work on restart planning as soon as the storm passes. Damage from the storm will hamper the restart and affect customer orders. The natural gas shortage and curtailment situation must improve for restart. Electrical grid concerns with ice moving into the region is a huge issue and could impact supply.

• The regulatory impact of the Biden administration is unknown at this time. This is the cause of the uncertainty.
• Consistency of the available workforce is hurt by the need to quarantine because of family exposure to COVID-19. Thank goodness for our early cross-training of personnel.
• COVID-related employee absences and quarantines are impacting output and increasing order backlog and delivery dates. In the restaurant and hospitality segments, orders and increasing interest are stimulated by the second-round PPP [Paycheck Protection Program] and SBA [Small Business Administration] funding to customers for outdoor venue expansions. Retail projects deferred from last year’s start are moving forward. Bad debt and slow payments are escalating within certain market segments.

• A $15 minimum wage would kill our small business. We are producing a lot, but cash flow is slow because our customers cannot pay us.
• We finally received some work, but one month does not a year make. We are still very pessimistic on the future, especially in the energy sector we depend on, under Biden's regressive policies.
• We are still waiting on oil and gas production to open up and stabilize. There is a sluggishness that is likely in part due to working through surplus excess equipment and uncertainty of the future that is slowing the restart of the industry in the U.S.
• We had a record year last year, and we should blow it away this year. The electronics and medical sectors are booming.
• Customers are once again requesting quotes at a rate much higher than what we have seen over the past 12 months. This is a very good indicator for future business. Generally, quotes turn into orders within 60–90 days. We also expect that the size of the order will be greater based on the requested quotes.

• Early signs point to February being better than January for revenue. We still believe there will be a second-half-of-the-year recovery for premises-based equipment sales.

• Production is down only because of a supplier problem; otherwise it would be great.
• Price increases are due to disruption of the supply chain and COVID-19 inefficiencies. The negative outlook for oil and gas affects our industry. Runaway government spending is expected to fuel inflation.
• We are very surprised about the weakness of the grid and other infrastructure revealed by the current meteorological event. We will need to understand what will be done to address this for future significant and unusual events.

• Corrugated packaging is currently experiencing a paper shortage that is affecting production and sales.

• The influence of COVID-19 has normalized itself. As vaccinations increase, we expect to see increases in volume from certain market segments and decreases in others. The net effect will be a slight increase. Demand and production of packaging for consumer packaged goods (food) as well as for institutional use (schools, hotels, restaurants) have been strong throughout the pandemic.
• Even though we continue to be very slow as compared to a year ago, February will be a much better billing month than January, and we are hopeful things will soon start to improve. Having access to PPP 2.0 monies will be a huge benefit to our workers, who otherwise would be almost guaranteed of working reduced hours and getting paid only for the hours worked. Now we will be able to pay them for more than we would have otherwise due to low activity levels.
• Weather and the Texas electric grid issues have depressed February.

Historical Data

Historical data can be downloaded dating back to June 2004.

Indexes

Download indexes for all indicators. For the definitions of all variables, see Data Definitions.

All Data

Download indexes and components of the indexes (percentage of respondents reporting increase, decrease, or no change). For the definitions of all variables, see Data Definitions.