Many will attest that they have never seen freight prices so high. Delivery dates are long, prices are skyrocketing, and there are areas of product shortages. Without being too political, many of these situations were on the horizon. Artificially high tariffs, dumping duties, and punitive charges against some countries, notably China, all create unnatural trade restrictions. Today, the industry is feeling the adverse effects. Government interference in trade rarely accomplishes anything tangible.

The last four months have been one of the most unusual periods of time that I have ever experienced in my 40 plus years of working. Surreal, actually. If in December someone would have told me that we were two months away from travel being halted worldwide, hotels shuttering and a pandemic killing hundreds of thousands of people it would be hard to believe.

We appreciate your continued support and hope that we will not only maintain our current levels of business but grow during this difficult period we find ourselves in. MGroup™ is operating in the “new normal” of how business is going to be done for the foreseeable future.

The protectionist trade policy process has targeted quartz from China and unfortunately has been expanded to other hospitality industry segments like vanities and millwork. We believe that there is enough clarity at this time that hospitality executives can begin to develop plans to provide a direction and a way forward within their organizations.

Sometimes my business travels take me directly to the site of front page news, sometimes of a very tragic nature. On Wednesday morning, the day I arrived in London, a small fire was reported in a 24 story residential tower block in West London, just off the Hammersmith & City tube line, in Kensington, one of the wealthiest parts of the city.