Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International (HARDI) shared its monthly TRENDS report on March 5, showing that January sales by member distributors increased by 9% year-over-year.

Boosted by an additional billing day vs. a year earlier, it was a sharp rebound a 7.8% monthly decrease during December and marked a strong start to 2024.

On an annual basis, the growth rate for the 12 months through January 2024 was 0.2%, likewise a reverse from the -0.3% through December.

“9% sales growth is a nice change from the 7% decline during December,” said HARDI Macroeconomic & Residential Market Analyst Brian Loftus. “With the same number of billing days we estimate the sales growth was closer to 4%.”

The Days Sales Outstanding — which measures how quickly customers pay their bills — was near 42 days during January. 

“We hear of additional stress in the marketplace, but there is not enough to inflame the Days Sales Outstanding for the industry,” Loftus added. “The January 2024 DSO was a bit better than January of 2023 and January of 2022. The performance is impressive after the rapid increase in rates and market adjustment during the past year.” 

“It looks like we are in a different world now with no sales growth after 20% annual sales gains not that long ago,” Loftus continued. “Flat sales mean comparable to the boomtimes of a year ago. This is just the next phase of the normalization process. We expect to be back in normal growth territory during the back half of this year.”