Covid-19 salutes, and update on fireworks, from my perspective.
Over the past couple of weeks, I have made, from scratch, 36 - 3" ground salutes, and this past weekend, I finally got them completed, all pasted. spiked, and pasted again.
For those of you who may be interested, here is the rundown of materials:
36 - 2.5" Very thick wall paper cans
72 - 1/8" Chipbord end disks w/7/16 Center Hole
72 - 1/8" Chipboard End disks, no hole
36 - 7/16" Spollette tubes, 1.5" long
about 9 Feet of High quality Spanish Black Match
36 - 4-3/4" X 2 feet 60lb. Kraft paper strips
36 - 5 1/2" X 3 feet 30lb. Kraft paper Strips
Nearly 720 Feet of 8-ply cotton string
just over 32 oz. Glue, thinned w/10% water
3.9lbs. KN03
just over 1.6 lbs Indian Dark AL
Total cost of materials was a little over $200.00 for this project ($5.55 for each one), and it took me about 60 hours, including drying time, so adding some value for the labor hours, these would have to be in the $45 - $50 range EACH! Who ever thinks that fireworks is not an expensive, time consuming endeavor?
The entire world is obviously in an unprecedented turmoil, as everyone knows. The Fireworks business as a whole, is also in some very dark waters. I have not fired a single shell since New Year's Eve! So, I have had ZERO revenues come in over these past 4 months, and a small company like mine, equated to over $100,000.00 in lost money. This is a huge hit, and one that I very well may not recover from. My insurance renewal alone that just came due this month, was a $10,000.00 Deposit, and $3,150.00 per month payment for the next 10 months. I am one of the fortunate companies, as all of my display materials came in this past September and October, so I am not waiting on any delayed shipments, but I still owe $196,000.00 to my vendor, and with ZERO money coming in, means that it is going to be very hard to meet any payment schedule for them, and it is already time to get my orders in for 2021! Problem now, is how to adjust for the materials that I still have on hand, and haven't used, and this creates a storage issue, as My storage is still FULL! This means that the manufactures, who are just now getting out of the crazy issues that were gong on in the manufacturing and shipping sectors, are finding that going into the NEXT year or two, there are going to be many residual issues in the supply and demand.
We are trying to salvage what we can for the July 4 season, and I am busy generating all the contracts, and permit paperwork, so we can just get it done as soon as possible, but every day brings news of one customer or another who are just not sure that their display is going to happen. Usually, all of our contracts are in, and permits are being let, but at this time, the majority of my customers will not even make a decision on their July fireworks display until Mid-May, up to the first of June. Budgets are also a contributing factor - some budgets come from Travel and Tourism, which we all know is just not happening. Some of our budgets come from Grant monies that are now either not going to be allocated, or may be postponed indefinitely. Some budgets that are allocated into the Parks and Recreation departments are now being looked at to be transferred into other accounts, as the cities and towns are also trying to continue to fund Emergency Services, or other more "essential" departments.
We are dependent on the deposit revenues from the majority of these contracts, in order to operate, and that revenue is just not coming in this year, so we are operating on what little cash-on-hand we have. That "reserve" is running out fast. The SBA programs that were put in place recently just was not enough, and we have found out that the larger, better connected businesses swallowed up those funds before they ever made it to the smaller, more deserving companies. MY bank had over 100,000 + requests, and that is just ONE Bank!
While I am trying to remain committed to keeping my business going, and trying to salvage as many displays as we possibly can, coming into this summer, I also have to realize that it may all be moot, as I cannot afford to put any more personal money into my business, as that money is just not there either.
In short, we are in sort of a "catch-22" and at this juncture, it is just a wait-and-see game. I would much rather see us keep these restrictions going for an additional couple of weeks, rather than opening thinks back up too early, and having a resurgence fo this virus that would result in another shut-down for an additional 6 - 8 weeks, the result of which would certainly be more devastating.
My very best wishes go out to all of you - and just stay safe, and well, and STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM EVERYBODY! We will eventually get out of this mess, but it will be a different scene from the "norm", but in the fireworks business, "normal" is a relative term!
Jeff Hale