Enough is Enough:

The Treated Lumber Industry Stands Up to a Destructive Campaign

February 17, 2009
Viance LLC
Steve Ainscough, President & CEO
200 East Woodlawn Road/Suite 350
Charlotte, NC 28217

Dear Steve,

As an industry we have a long and well-established history of providing safe and reliable pressure-treated lumber products. Today, we’re taking the unusual step of coming together to denounce the recent efforts being employed by Viance LLC to discredit micronized copper pressure-treated lumber. Some of us manufacture these products; some of us do not. We all are concerned about the negative impact this campaign is having on our industry.

This campaign is either an ill-advised marketing ploy or an inappropriate method for addressing technical concerns.

If technical questions exist, there are well-established forums in our industry to voice and address them. Those forums are already engaged in this issue and include the Forest Products Journal and the International Research Group on Wood Preservation (IRG). We are strongly encouraging all concerned parties to learn about recent developments in these forums: http://www.forestprod.org/features.html and http://www.irgamericas.org/.

We value healthy competition. This is not about competition; this is about a self-serving marketing crusade that threatens the reputation and questions the integrity of an entire industry. As concerned members of the pressure-treated community, we urge Viance LLC to abandon this damaging campaign.

Doug O’Rourke, Director of Sales & Purchasing
Biewer Lumber

Michel Pascarella, Vice President
Valley Timber Sales, Inc.

James W. Rane, President & CEO
Great Southern Wood Preserving, Inc.

Mike Reimer, President
Western Wood Preserving Co.

Mack Singleton, President & CEO
New South

Darrell R. Smith, Vice President of Operations
Conrad Wood Preserving Co.

John Stauber, President
Innovative Pine Technology

Scott Steinkamp, President & CEO
Steinkamp Southern Indiana Wood Treating, Inc.

Ben Stimpson, President
Gulf Treating, Inc.

Hal Bumby, President
Maine Wood Treaters, Inc.

Tom Evans, President
Coastal Treated Products Company

Carey Garst, President & CEO
Rocky Top Building Products

Michael B. Glenn, CEO
Universal Forest Products

Bob Hixson, CEO
Hixson Lumber Sales

Bert Jones, President
Mid-States Wood Preservers, LLC

Larry Lang, Vice President
Culpeper

Keith Laugen, President
Lake States Lumber

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