• HARDI announces Alan Beaulieu as Chief Economist for the Organization

    July 16, 2009
    HARDI announces Alan Beaulieu as Chief Economist for the Organization

    HARDI is pleased to announce that Alan Beaulieu, Principal and Executive Vice President of the Institute for Trend Research (ITR®), has been designated the HARDI Chief Economist.

    Over the past year, Beaulieu and his team have been producing the popular monthly HARDI HVACR Sales Trends Report. ITR has been providing economic trending information, speaking engagements at HARDI national and regional meetings, and relevant economic articles in HARDI publications. Beaulieu will continue to correlate regional and national HARDI sales trends data into the quarterly HARDI T.R.E.N.D.S. Report as well as producing the Executive Summary and regional reports for each of HARDI’s seven U.S. regions.

    Building on this successful business relationship with ITR®, HARDI leadership decided to utilize the many additional services ITR® can offer HARDI members. New this month HARDI will host a series of Interactive Regional Forecasting (IRF) programs, an audio only mini-seminar, for each of the HARDI U.S. regions. In each of these sessions Alan Beaulieu will give a live in-depth explanation about the information in the regional reports and respond to questions from participants. The first offering of this new activity will occur later in July and will be open to all HARDI members. Subsequent quarterly programs will be available only to those companies who submit their information as a participant in the data collection survey managed by ITR®.

    Another new additional benefit of particular interest to members is the option that ITR® through Alan Beaulieu will provide non-data exchange consulting where members are welcome to call him or ITR® staff with economic questions. In this capacity, Alan Beaulieu will serve as HARDI Chief Economist and be available to assist members in their decision-making process in these precarious economic times.

    HARDI is extremely pleased to be able to offer its members this new look on the horizon of what will be impacting their businesses. Members who have heard Alan Beaulieu or read his reports have agreed that Beaulieu has been “on the money” in his forecasting and that his reports have brought value to business decisions. With his designation as “HARDI Chief Economist” this benefit to members will expand even further.

    ITR has provided services to business leaders from 32 states with companies doing business in over 45 countries of the world. Their monthly macroeconomic report, EcotrendsTM is read by hundreds of executives representing over 120 different industries and markets, including: finance and financial management, housing, non-residential construction, shipbuilders, real estate, agriculture, retail and wholesale trade, transportation, information technology, architects and designers, health care, importers, exporters, food production, commodities, oil and gas, computer and software technology, employment services, and educational services.

    The Heating, Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Distributors International (HARDI) represents over 460 wholesale companies, including 17 international companies, plus over 300 manufacturing associates and nearly 140 manufacturer representatives. It is estimated that HARDI members represent 80 percent of the dollar value of the HVACR products sold through distribution.