I know, it’s been a while since I last wrote and during most of this year I have not been contributing very much to the TTJ, simply because every waking moment seems to be spent keeping the day job going.

Unless I’m mistaken, it’s almost certainly the same for you; as one senior member of the trade said to me recently, “I never realised how easy it was to run a business when times were good!”

Realistically, this winter is likely to be diabolical – those shorter, colder days are historically slower; there’s little chance of that changing in this economic climate.

So, do we reach for the kitchen knife, the gin bottle, hibernate or keep going? Well, in the midst of all this mayhem there do seem to be signs that we’re near the end of this mess.

The pound looks to have made a whimpering attempt at fighting back; money is available for sensible lending, at sensible rates; the economy should avoid a double dip; and we are seeing an upturn in housing transactions.

2010 is not likely to be anything other than ‘bland’ at best, but hey, that would be great and would allow most of us to be able to plan a way forwards.

On the industry side of things we’re seeing far more cohesion between associations and other interested parties – the recent agreement by the Timber Industry Education &?Training Group with Proskills is a fine example and now there’s talk of a generic promotional campaign.

I only wish that we could all reduce our operating costs by stopping the ridiculous bureaucracy that surrounds chain of custody – after the UK government vetted all the schemes and set them as being equal, we still have to segregate identical items into two piles, purely because one of these schemes sees themselves as being closer to God than the others! I dread to think what the financial impact of this is.

Regrettably, some companies will fall by the wayside and that’s always sad, but the Darwinian theory on evolution is always going to happen, so if you’re in the mind to survive this lot, keep fit and healthy.