Fletcher Building’s subsidiary Winstone Wallboards (WWB) has announced it will supply additional GIB to customers from July.
In April, New Zealand’s biggest manufacturer, Fletcher Building, said it had been caught unawares by the demand for GIB, with builders going to desperate lengths to get their hands on it. Fletcher supplies 95% of GIB to the market.
In a statement on Thursday, the company said, "through a series of measures, many of which have been in train for months, we have advised our merchant customers that additional product will be available for them to distribute from July.
"This equates to an additional one million square metres of plasterboard in the market through the July to September period and a 7% to 8% increase of various types of plasterboard."
It comes ahead of a crisis meeting between Fletcher, Simplicity and the Shareholder’s Association on Friday morning.
“The current plasterboard supply constraints are being driven by the record levels of building activity," said Fletcher Building chief executive Ross Taylor.
"We understand the issues impacting the industry and, given our unique role as one of New Zealand’s remaining large-scale manufacturers, we have been, and will continue to do, everything possible across all our operations to alleviate the situation.
“The increases we will be bringing to market are possible because we will soon commission changes to the configuration of our manufacturing that we have been working on over the past three months which will produce extra, locally produced, volumes.
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"We have also been able to secure and will import additional board from an Australian manufacturer that we can feed into our supply chain.
“With these measures, we have increased our committed volumes from 1 July into our merchant customers."
Taylor said the company's PlaceMakers distribution arm will use a portion of its extra volume to create a pool of plasterboard to focus on builders with critical needs.
He said it will be done at a local level across the country, so this emergency supply pool is directed to those with the most pressing needs.
"It’s reasonable to expect that the other building merchants will sell their extra volume to the builders who both can use it immediately and who need it the most.
“More broadly, the allocation model we have introduced is beginning to make positive inroads with supply. We are also on track to open our new state-of-the art manufacturing facility in Tauriko, Tauranga next year.
"Construction began in 2020 and the new plant will increase our production output by 50%, providing the long- term capacity to more than meet current plasterboard demand levels."
“There’s no doubt that the building and construction industry is doing it tough, given the current market conditions and we empathise with all our customers who are being impacted. We are committed to continuing to support and grow our industry and are investing significantly in its future.”
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