THE VOICE OF THE EQUIPMENT RENTAL INDUSTRY

 

The second ERA/IRN RentalTracker survey reveals continued difficult business conditions in Europe’s rental sector, but with confidence indicators heading in the right direction and indications that many renters see conditions either bottoming out or no longer deteriorating at the same rate.

 

Over 200 companies in Europe responded to the online survey at the end of September/beginning of October, and the results reveal that the balance of respondents who feel the market is deteriorating fell from last quarter’s negative -40% balance (the difference between the proportion seeing an improvement and those seeing deterioration) to a less  severe -15%.

 

That means a small majority still see conditions worsening, but a far smaller proportion than three months ago.

 

The survey is jointly operated by International Rental News (IRN) magazine and the European Rental Association (ERA). The full results will be published in the November-December issue of IRN, and will also be available on the ERA website (www.erarental.org).

 

Deteriorations in time utilization also appear to be stabilising, with a negative balance of opinion of -26% compared to more than -50% three months ago. It is also clear that rental companies have not much changed their views on fleet investment, with the balance between those who will spend more or less next year at -6%, a slight improvement on the last quarter.

 

One survey respondent told us; “I sincerely hope that we are rumbling at the bottom of the downturn now, but I think the recovery will be quite slow in the next 12 months and then add on more speed.”

 

For the first time, we have included a measure of how companies view prospects for their businesses one year from now. This shows a positive balance of +26% (43% expect conditions to be better, 16% worse).

 

To provide a ‘total view’ of the survey we have created a RentalTracker Barometer – see illustration. This combines views on current market conditions; the market now compared to the same quarter last year; and sentiment on how the market will be in a year’s time.

 

For the third quarter the barometer is in the ‘upturn’ segment, although the modest nature of the upturn is reflected in the short length of the arrow (the stronger the trend, the longer the arrow.)

 

Among the larger market areas (France, Italy, Germany, France, Spain and Nordic countries) there is strong agreement on current business conditions, with a typical negative balance of around -20%. The one exception to this is France, where the balance was zero (an equal number seeing improving and deteriorating conditions).


The results of the first edition of the tracker attracted answers from over 230 companies. Its results are available here.