Steve Keller
Analyst · Credit Suisse. Your line is now open
Sure. You bet, Jamie. Well, as far as your [indiscernible] obviously January I think has a record, it was a near record low, second largest in history, right. As I look at it, it was driven a lot by a lot of large fleets, a lot of your public fleets, large public carriers purchased, a lot of leasing companies purchased here in January, so big order intake in certain levels. We typically you know, our business is more broad-based you know, we're not just tied to the big large fleets. I think that's what the strength in 2017 showed up where we were like 21% there in the market because it was great - you know, it was broad based. That's why I said, our market share might be up a little bit in 2018 because we're going to have a lot - I think it's going to be lot more over the road growth than there was last year, because those customers obviously you know, I don't have - sorry about to competitors reports. You know, everybody's rates have gone up quite nicely. So I would expect the over the road business to pick up. But concurrently I expect the vocational business to remain strong. It probably won't have as big a pick up percentage wise, as the over the road business will, but it's still going to be strong. It had its big pickup last year which is why we picked up a lot of market share. But you know, the road business wasn't strong last year, do you follow what I'm saying. So while we do over the road business obviously lots, when it bounces like that we tend to maybe get a little less percentage [ph] of the market, but don't read into that that we're not going to get our fair share of broad based across where it is. As far as taking away from '19, you know, I think it's a little too early for me to say that. I mean, it has climbed dramatically when you look from where we were four or five months ago. I think ACTs forecast were you know, somewhere around a year from '17 to '18 and now we're up about 25% about 50,000 units roughly. And so obviously there is that concern that it could take away from them. But you know, we got to let it play out and see if it will maintain that pace throughout the year. But I don't hear maintaining the paces ahead in January by any stretch. But you know, I don't see it - you know activity from our perspective is still strong. We - I looked at our backlog, when I look at ours, our backlog is up, where compare year-over-year yearend our backlog is up probably about 20%, 20%, 25%. Now that being said, our backlog tends to peak inside Rush not till the summer time. So we are - you know, a lot of the business that we booked is going on right now which will dictate where we're at. As we all know a whole lot more when I get to April and May is to what our whole year personally looks like, because we've got quite a bit of activity going on at this moment. And so we're - you know, I expect especially on some on these vocational and some of these other - these other markets, not just the over the road business. As far as the parts and service business, I really couldn't be beat the heart beat - I guess, I could be more pleased. You could always be more pleased and it would be a fair statement, but am I pleased yes, as to where we're at. I think you know, I was - I came about two years ago and I started talking about our strategic initiatives, as I said more than once, you know, I got to get over our skis, get over my skis here in 2016 and early '17 you know, getting the results, the kind of investment it takes to get these results because of some focused initiatives that I probably won't get into the exact focus statistics on the call. But it is very clear and obvious to me that these initiatives are paying off. You know as I said last quarter coming our Q3, I thought that some of the strategic initiatives will - we narrowed it down and these are - I am going to say approximate, but I'm very solid, I'm pretty solid with the numbers, because sometimes it's not an exact science, but I'm solid that we have about 25% of our growth, as I went to Q3 if I remember right was based upon our strategic initiatives, a lot more in the energy sector and on the overall broad sector. Now in Q4 when we looked into the results it was - energy was only 15% of the growth. Yet we had huge growth year-over-year 16% was just outstanding. I can't remember a quarter like that in a while, on a year-over-year basis. But the great part was we had 35% that was directly attributable to the initiatives that we've undertaken over the last two years inside a five year plan which is really probably - you know, we've got some goodwill goal stretch out to 2022 that we'll communicate obviously in the conferences and stuff and do. So I feel good about that. I would tell you typically you go through the winner, and you know, I've always said before back that February - get rid of November, December, January and February sometimes I would love the holidays, but its stuff on business, less working days and just things tends a little bit slower. We've got a lot of stores in the south. So you know there's no air conditioning work and things like that. But I would tell you this is probably the strongest November through February that I've seen probably in my career in a long time. So I feel real good about it. And spring opens up here and you know, continues to - we move forward in the spring. And you know, we thought a little bit around, I feel very good about where we're at. And as I said you know, the focus of the organization on achieving these initiatives and I think our folks could see that they are doable and they are committed to it and we are definitely focused on that. So I know I didn't give you an exact growth rate, but I would expect to stay you know, I always hedge my back to stay high singles and hopefully we'll be in low double-digit growth rates in the parts and service business. But as I also said and I'm going to accelerate some of the investment inside some of these levers that will be using [indiscernible] still continue to facilitate that topline in that gross profit growth rate, that's what we're looking at. So I mean going to spend a little, as I said in the release, but I think that's what we're supposed to do, I believe, okay. I am not supposed to just hold it, I am supposed to spend a little and grow our parts and service business because obviously that's the key piece of our organization and that's the changes in our company over the last few years, where the revenues truly come from, where the gross profits really will come from. So we're excited about what we've seen and this makes us more excited for the future.