Recent content by rbstern

And that may be the right choice for your situation. Hedging isn't right for every business. But if you are buying $250K of a commodity each month and it represents a substantial input to your cost of goods and services, and want any kind of pricing stability, it's an appropriate tool. That's...

Sorry, but no. First of all, commodity steel contracts are close to 2/lb right now. Will cost more in finished sheet, bar stock, or round stock form that a manufacturer like EA would buy from a wholesale supplier. Which means the steel in the implement you described is going to be at least...

A hedge contract can be as simple as a futures option on commodity steel. It's a simple calculation to figure out how much of a future option to buy at a given price in order to provide protection against a substantial rising commodity price. If the commodity price goes up sharply, you execute...

It's not a bad model. It's just missing a key leg: The standard approach to make that model work is commodities hedge contracts. The airlines do it with fuel, to make the cost predictable, since they are selling tickets well in advance of providing service, and fuel costs are the biggest...

That's why I wrote "Walmart in that era". Walmart is headed in the same direction, but at a slower pace than Sears. In fairness, Sears was founded much earlier, and Sam Walton has only been gone for a little more than 20 years. Walmart is trying to adapt, but the challenges are many. You can...

Haven't been on the site much lately, was surprised to catch up to this thread. I've never done business with EA. Looked at them a few times before choosing something else. Watched many of their videos over the years. Came away with the strong impression that they cared enough to build...

That's an easy one. I used to write software for the retail trade. Went to Sears HQ to pitch it to one of their category managers. Mind you, that's a low-to-mid level managerial position. Was told by his secretary (in a day and age where few people had secretaries any more) to address him as...

The inserts I'm looking at claim 75% efficiency. IIRC, my propane furnaces are in the 80 to 85% range.

Well said.

1 cord of firewood BTUs = 215 gallons LP BTUs. I'm probably using about 600 gallons of LP to heat my house. $3 per gallon, roughly. I'm already burning a bunch of the wood in a very inefficient fireplace that, while great for ambiance, sucks at actually heating the house. The same firewood...

The "how you value your time" analogy is often a bit too soft for my liking. Those are rabbit holes I prefer not to go down. This is easy: I'm processing a cord or two of firewood per year. Another couple of cords will take me another couple of days of something I enjoy doing. In the...

Insulation: We foamed the roof. Most of the house sq. ft. is the great room, with high ceiling and no attic. The existing fireplace isn't an insert. It's just a manufactured fireplace: A Heatilator I80.

I usually save all documentation. Finding it is another matter...but I found the fireplace manual. Quote from the install maual: B. Wood Burning Inserts WARNING! Risk of Fire! Improper installation of wood inserts may cause fireplace or chimney system to overheat.If a wood burning insert is...

House seals up fairly well, and the fireplace does have an outside intake. No on the water based heat, but I have open an truss floor system in the main residence, and it's a a short, straight shot to the mechanical room, thru the trusses, right past the hot water lines. The inside plumbing...

We run through about $1800 worth of propane a year in our 5 year old home: 2200 sq ft ranch, 75% finished basement, 2 propane furnaces, on demand propane hot water heater, propane stove/oven, propane starter fireplace. We also use the fireplace a fair amount. We keep the thermostat at 68...