Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International (HARDI), Columbus, Ohio, this week released its monthly TRENDS report, showing the average sales performance by HARDI distributors was an increase of 21.4% during December.

The average annual sales growth for the 12 months through December 2020 is 4.1%.

“What a great way to end a challenging year,” said HARDI Market Research & Benchmarking Analyst Brian Loftus. “This December was helped by an extra billing day but even adjusting for that the sales growth would have been in the 16% area against 7.4% last year.”

The Days Sales Outstanding (DSO), a measure of how quickly customers pay their bills, is now at 44.5 days.

“While the health challenges and the employment disruption are heartbreaking, much of the economy keeps churning along,” said Loftus. “Q4 GDP was up 4% after a 30% decline six months ago, low mortgage rates have the housing market soaring, and the latest Industrial Production report was stronger than expected. It all seems fragile and temporary until there is broad distribution of potent vaccines.”