At the Cabient Makers Association meet-up in Chicago, woodshop owners revealed how commercial case work and home cabinetry and interior renovation kept them afloat this year, as new residential work evaporated.

As mentioned in my last blog, the CMA group got together right before Thanksgiving, though many of them were at their pre-holiday busiest.

Jeff Schrock said his while his woodwork was all focused on residential, it was exclusively remodeling - no new construction cabinetmkaing opportunities appeared this year in his market around Toledo in southern Illinois.

"We haven't had one new residential home this year," Schrock told me. Not a subscriber to bid lines services, "We get our business from referrals," he noted.

Joe Delude of Cabinet One in Clarkston, MI, said cabinetmakers have gotten used to having much less business in the pipeline.

"It used to be if you didn't have weeks of work already booked, you'd be freaking out," he said. "Now, if you have two days worth of work ahead of you, you're happy."

And Cleland Noe told us his Counterpoint Cabinetry, Wilmette, IL, found work in commercial office buildouts and medical facility work.