06.04.2009

Essex up 27%

US crawler crane rental company, Essex Crane, has reported a 26.7 percent rise in 2008 rental revenues to $61.9 million, while total revenues grew by just over nine percent to $85.3 million.

However the company, which was subject to a buy out in 2008, posted a $4.7 million pre-tax loss for the period compared to a $14.3 million profit in 2007.

Included in the loss was a $14.8 million (net of tax) goodwill impairment without this the company says it would have made a net profit of $2.9 million.

The company said that many of its market sectors, largely infrastructure - highways, bridges, airports, power plants and water management projects; institutional - schools, stadiums, hospitals and government buildings etc were not as adversely affected by the weakening economy as residential and light commercial construction.

Average crane rental rates increased 31.4 percent to $21,382 per crane per rental month, compared with $16,266 in 2007. Much of the increase was as a result of Essex Crane’s changes in fleet towards larger, higher rental rate cranes with greater capacity.

Essex Crane president Ron Schad said: “During the fourth quarter, the challenging commercial credit environment, economic uncertainty and lower oil prices impacted our customers and new order activity, including downstream power and petrochemical owners, who chose to defer certain maintenance projects. During the latter portion of the first quarter of 2009, we began to see a pickup in quoting activity that is consistent with levels in the same period last year.”

“In addition, our quoting activity leads us to believe we will realize a benefit beginning in the second half of 2009 from infrastructure projects included in the Federal Stimulus Bill that target highway and heavy bridge construction, civil works programs, and water and wastewater treatment. Alternative energy projects, especially wind energy, are also expected to general higher levels of quoting activity.”
Essex has a fleet of 350 lattice-boom crawler cranes.