Furniture Factory Orders Rose 10% in November

Backlog also increases

New orders for residential furniture in November were 10% ahead of the previous November, according to the latest survey by the accounting firm Smith Leonard.

The results, published in the firm’s monthly Furniture Insights newsletter, followed October results that showed orders were flat with the previous October. That marked the first month since October 2007 that new orders were not lower than the same month from the previous year.

“(W)e may, in fact, be hitting the bottom,” analyst Ken Smith wrote in the newsletter. “Two months do not really create a trend, but it is certainly a start.”

November shipments were 1% below November 2008, but the order backlog among those surveyed was 7% ahead of the previous November.

For the first 11 months of 2009, new orders were 14% below the first 11 months of 2008, and shipments were 17% below the prior year.

“While there are still many companies out there that are really hurting, it seems that most companies have made adjustments to current volume levels,” Smith wrote.