Top 10 Service Center Equipment Brands
Service center executives reveal their favorite makes of metal processing equipment in this informal brand survey by Metal Center News.
The top three vote-getters in the category “Cutting” were Hypertherm, Messer Cutting Systems and Trumpf; Generally, only a handful of votes separated the market leaders.
Information for these brand rankings was gathered as part of MCN’s Outlook Survey last fall and in a series of e-mail polls in the first quarter. Respondents were given an alphabetical list of the 14 largest companies in each product category with instructions to “check all they would endorse and buy from in the future.” Respondents also had the opportunity to write in additional company names or brands not on the lists.
The final ranking, based simply on the total number of votes each company received, gives a rough indication of which brands currently command the largest share of mind, and highest levels of customer satisfaction, among service center executives. This methodology does not attempt to rank companies by size or market share, but rather to measure the relative level of brand awareness they have achieved among respondents to MCN’s surveys. Due to the limited sample size, this ranking should be viewed as an informal measure of brand preference.
Metals distributors have been on a capital spending binge over the past two decades as they have added value-added processing capabilities to increase revenues and differentiate themselves from the competition. Lingering concerns about the economy are tempering most spending plans, however. According to MCN data gathered last fall, only about 28 percent of service centers planned to spend more on new processing equipment this year than they did in 2012, while 38 percent planned to spend less.
“The median capital budget for service centers this year is in the $100,000 to $250,000 range, down from last year, according to MCN data. The typical service center/processor derives about 20 percent of his revenues from the value-added side of the business.”
Source: Metal Center News