Lawn & Garden Tools

INDUSTRIAL CODES

NAICS: 33-3112 Lawn and Garden Tractor and Home Lawn and Garden Equipment Manufacturing

SIC: 3524 Lawn and Garden Equipment Manufacturing

NAICS-Based Product Codes: 33-31121, 33-31123, 33-31127, 33-3112W, and 33-3111J

PRODUCT OVERVIEW

The lawn and garden tools industry talks about its product, in the aggregate, as green goods—this despite the fact that a rather large proportion of the actual objects sold are various shades of red, sometimes yellow, and occasionally black. But the phrase, of course, refers to the great outdoors. The term is also intended to convey that lawn and garden products are a category of appliance. The trade talks about their indoor counterparts as white goods—despite modern preferences for indoor appliances that come in a variety of bright colors to match the décor of kitchens and laundry rooms of the United States.

From the consumer's perspective, everything in the garage or outdoor shed falls into the category of lawn and garden tools, be the specific object a lawnmower, a power trimmer, a shovel, a rake, or a set of garden shears. In the corporate sector, the category means power-driven tools. Yet another way of classifying things is that adopted by the U.S. Census Bureau, the nation's collector of economic data. The Census Bureau divides this category into power-driven lawn and garden equipment, in which category it includes mowers, tractors, and snow blowers. It classifies chainsaws as power-driven hand tools produced by a different industrial category. Furthermore, at least some of the implements (like shovels and rakes, for instance), are classified as hand and edge tools. Finally, the Census Bureau classifies commercial-grade mowers and tractors under farm machinery and equipment. The discussion presented in this essay will be focused on power-driven outdoor tools used by the consumer, including chainsaws and also commercial turf maintenance equipment. The main reason for this delimitation is the availability of good statistical information and also because data from the industry itself aligns well with this approach.

The largest single segment of this category is lawn care, and the dominant product is the lawnmower. Mowers come in an ascending hierarchy of overall expense, beginning with the simple gas-engine-driven mower. Just a few such mowers are electrically operated, usually by battery power, preferred by those who dislike the noise of the engines, the smell of hydrocarbon fumes, or wish to avoid the environmental impact of relatively uncontrolled gasoline combustion. Mowers are usually hand-propelled, but the cutting action is supplied by the engine. Some mowers are also machine-propelled so that the user need only guide but need not push the device. Riding mowers, also called lawn tractors, are the next step up. Rather more powerful and comfortable garden tractors occupy the summit; some of these have special features such as the ability to pivot around their center-point for maximum access to hemmed-in locations; they also feature gearing in reverse. Supplementing these basic lawn tools are edge and weed trimmers, lawn vacuums and sweepers, leaf blowers, and power spray devices to clean up the sidewalks and the driveway. Most of these devices can be purchased powered by batteries driving electric motors or by gasoline engines. People who have large amounts of waste matter to reduce to manageable heaps, or for composting, can also buy shredders or choose mowers specifically designed to mulch the grass.

Snow blowers, sometimes called snow throwers, provide an outdoor device of equivalent heft and power to the homeowner in winter. These come in small, often electrically-driven packages on up to massive, self-propelled machines powered by gasoline engines.

A smaller but still sizeable category of products serve in assisting the homeowner in the management, not least the removal, of trees and large bushes. The principal product is the engine-driven chainsaw. The homeowner who must have everything will likely also acquire a log splitter, a stump cutter, and have a chipper or wood-waste shredder. For trimming and dressing bushes, he or she will also have a trimmer, typically powered by a rechargeable battery pack.

For soil preparation the homeowner has a choice of tillers and cultivators powered so that the effort to turn, loosen, and prepare the soil will require virtually no muscle-power. These devices may be quite small and intended to serve a person squatting down by a flower bed or may be quite large devices with wheels intended to be walked behind. Lawn aerators belong in this category as well. These devices are more typically used by commercial services; they are usually employed just once a year, in spring. Homeowners, however, may rent them from supply houses.

Commercial turf care equipment includes all of the products mentioned above, with the difference that the tools are designed for constant use, are often very large, and have special features. Commercial service providers also use golf cars and other self-propelled utility vehicles in getting their work done; such vehicles are, therefore, also included as products of this industry.

Finally, all of these products have attachments and accessories purchased as options and are supported by servicing dealers who, for instance, will sharpen or replace lawnmower blades or chainsaw chains. The core product underlying all of these products is the gasoline engine. Only a few companies make engines; the majority of producers buy engines from others.

MARKET

The last economic census completed at the time of this writing, conducted in the year 2002, showed total industry shipments for powered lawn and garden tools of $8 billion. Products aimed for the household accounted for $6.5 billion and commercial turf equipment for $1.55 billion of that total, or 80.7 and 19.3 percent respectively. Subsequent annual surveys conducted by the government in the 2003 to 2005 period, the Annual Survey of Manufactures, and trend projections thereafter indicate a 2008 market of approximately $10.14 billion. Between 1997 and 2002, the industry declined at an annual rate of 1.8 percent, but losses were not uniform. Within the consumer category, the largest segment in 1997, non-powered lawnmower shipments declined at a rate of 2.8 percent per year, but all other segments registered growth at an annual rate: riding mowers increased at 1.4 percent, parts shipments at a rate of 1.6 percent, and other equipment (hand held tools and snow equipment) at a rate of 3.7 percent per year. Growth in the commercial turf equipment market was also positive; it grew at a rate of 3 percent per year. Projections suggest that the entire industry's annual growth rate will have been just under 4 percent per year between 2002 and 2008.

As a consequence of the decline in non-riding lawn-mower shipments in the period from 1997 to 2002, riding mowers became the largest single segment in the consumer-oriented part of this industry. In 2002 riding equipment represented 43.7 percent of total shipments, just a nose ahead of non-riding equipment, representing 43.4 percent of shipments. Parts represented 11.6 and the rapidly growing "other equipment" category 1.4 percent of shipments.

The lawn and garden equipment sector is a well-established and mature industry responding only slowly to broader forces in the economy. The market tends to soften in economic down-turns and to flourish or languish in response to trends in housing. If the devil is in the details, the details illuminating the closing years of the twentieth and the opening years of the twenty-first century suggest both a slight reaction to the economic downturn that came in 2001 and also a process of upgrading: expenditures shifted to the more expensive product segment within this industry's consumer/household segment, illustrated by the growth in riding mowers and, especially, in the sale of other equipment—the tillers, shredders, leaf blowers, and similar hand-held categories. The functions performed by these tools, of course, could be performed with much less expensive tools like shovels and rakes. Meanwhile the commercial sector, which flourishes with the growth of services provided to homeowners and institutions, illustrates that a segment of the public used more commercial services and, for that reason perhaps, did not replace that old mower. This mixed picture results in modest growth projections from 2002 forward.

Census Bureau data are excellent for gauging the production picture but less helpful in tracing the flow of goods from producers downward to the point of sale. At the wholesale level of the market, Census Bureau data blend the details of this industry with that of farm equipment and report the results only for Farm and Garden Machinery and Equipment Merchant Wholesalers. Details for product categories are not reported so that the wholesale level is entirely swamped by the farm machinery category. At the same time, the Census Bureau data for the retail level, reported for the category Outdoor Power Equipment Stores shows only a portion of the industry's shipments as moving through this specialized channel, 68 percent of shipments in 2002. A presumed 32 percent of the total volume shipped is thus delivered to market by big box retailers such as Home Depot and Lowe's as well as the department stores. But even these data, scant as they are, support the presumption of a general upgrading process by the consumer. In 1997 the specialized outdoor power equipment stores accounted for a smaller portion of shipments, 54.5 percent, with 45.5 percent left to larger retailers more likely to offer a discount. This suggests that, by 2002, more consumers bought from specialists who offer the more pricey products (like garden tractors) that also require higher levels of service.

KEY PRODUCERS/MANUFACTURERS

In 2002, according to the Census Bureau counts, the U.S. lawn and garden tools industry had 128 participating companies. The top 35 participants, listed in Figure 122, are arranged alphabetically by name and by seven major product categories. This is not an exhaustive list of producers; readers who do not see their favorite brand may discover that the brand is owned by one of the companies listed or is the offering of a smaller participant.

By the very nature of the products sold in this industry, the most expensive and complex component of a lawn and garden tool is its gasoline engine or its electrical driver, including the motor, battery pack, and charging mechanism. Historically the industry had been structured around a few engine builders who did not make the tools themselves and a large number of companies that built the tools around a purchased engine. This has changed, but it was once quite common for people to say that their lawn-mower was a Briggs & Stratton when, in fact, the maker of the mower had bought a Briggs & Stratton engine. Even well into the first decade of the twenty-first century, this pattern still largely holds. Briggs & Stratton remains the world's leading producer of small engines; the majority of lawnmowers sold, under whatever brand name, have such engines. Tecumseh Power Company, another U.S. engine producer, is second largest in the U.S. market. Two other U.S. companies participate in a leading role. Both sell more powerful engines: Kohler Company and Caterpillar, Inc. The latter is an important supplier of heavy-duty engines for heavier equipment used in some of the commercial turf products.

Competition in the engine market intensified in the 1980s with the entrance of Japanese companies into the market, Honda and Kawasaki. Both offered engines for lawn and garden tools adapted to this market from the small engines they used to power motorcycles. Honda departed from the long-established pattern in the industry by offering both engines and lawn tools under its own brand. American Honda Motor Co., based in Swepsonville, North Carolina, now produces 75 percent of all of Honda's small engines and powered lawn and garden tools on U.S. soil. Three other Japanese companies are key participants in the engine market. Redmax is the American entity organized by Komatsu Zenoah and is a participant, also, in a variety of lawn and garden tools like trimmers and chainsaws. Robin America, Inc. was organized by Fuji Heavy Industries to distribute the Subaru line of Robin engines. Shindaiwa, Inc., like Redmax, is an engine maker that also sells trimmers and similar tools but not lawnmowers. The leading supplier of electrically powered walk-behind lawnmowers is Black & Decker, the world's leading producer of electrically-powered tools.

Not surprisingly, Briggs & Stratton began to diversify, perhaps in response to Honda's and other engine makers' entry into the market. In 2004 the company acquired Simplicity Manufacturing, Inc., a company that had already grown by acquisition and had a comprehensive line of products including commercial turf maintenance products.

The world's largest producer of lawnmowers in 2005 was MTD Products, a U.S. company, with a 25 percent share of the market, followed by Husqvarna, a Swedish company, with 20 percent. Huqvarna was then still owned by Electrolux Home Products. In that year Murray, Inc., held a 15 percent share. Murray is not listed in Figure 122 because it filed for bankruptcy and, at time of writing, was attempting to reorganize. The Toro Corporation held the fourth largest share at 11 percent. Snapper, Inc. (owned by Simplicity Manufacturing Inc.), perhaps best known for its riding mowers, still held a 2 percent share of the lawnmower market in the United States in 2005. Leaders in the lawn tractor/garden tractor category in 2005 were John Deere, Electrolux Home Products, owners of American Yard Products, MTD, Simplicity/Snapper, and Toro, in that order.

The largest participants in the lawn and garden equipment market tend to offer a wide range of products, thus mowers as well as tractors, snow blowers, as well as hand-operated equipment like trimmers, leaf blowers, and chainsaws. Among the major participants, Husqvarna, John Deere, and Toro also offer commercial turf maintenance equipment, but, by and large, that market is dominated by specialists who have their roots in farm or construction equipment manufacturing or have specialized, since their inception, in heavy-duty professional equipment. Examples of such companies are Bush Hog, LLC, Exmark Manufacturing, Walker Manufacturing, and Woods Equipment Company.

Trends in the consumer portion of this market, the dominant portion, representing 81 percent of all equipment sales, has been in the direction of consolidation and, occasionally, divestiture. An example of the latter has been the purchase of Husqvarna by Electrolux Home Products in 1997 and its divestiture of the same property in 2006. More typical has been aggregation of assets—and most notably brand names—by acquisition. The brand names continue to be maintained although ownership and marketing arrangements change. Indeed, it is often difficult, when looking at a subsidiary, to discover that it is actually owned by someone else. Consumer-oriented companies have acquired capabilities in the commercial sector to round out their offerings; but the same trends in reverse, with commercial companies entering the consumer market, are not discernible.

MATERIALS & SUPPLY CHAIN LOGISTICS

The Outdoor Power Equipment Institute (OPEI) published a study in 2002 in which it analyzed inputs to the industry, dividing these into materials on the one hand and components on the other. The Institute measured these as percentages of the total value of shipments of which they were made a part. Data for the year 2000 indicated that raw materials represented 24.1 percent of total shipments in that year, up from 13.7 percent in 1996 and 9.6 percent in 1992. Purchased components in 2000 were 38.7 percent of shipments, down from 45.8 percent in 1996 and 47.6 percent in 1992. These data, of course, reflect the trend noted above—consolidation. Producers were buying fewer components and buying more materials—making more of the finished product in-house from scratch. What, then, are these materials and components?

The largest material categories were steel (41.5%), plastics (24.3%), shipping cartons (15.5%), other materials (7.9%), paint (4.5%), and aluminum (1.7%). Not surprisingly, engines lead acquired component costs, representing 47.5 percent of total. The next four categories are transmissions (13.8%), cables and controls (6.7%), engine parts (6.2%), and tires (2.7%). This listing, also provided by OPEI, indicates that even grass catching bags for lawnmowers and seats for riding mowers are purchased components, also cutting blades and fuel tanks. These patterns very much support what closer familiarity with the industry reveals: most companies actually fabricate only a portion of the tool itself. In the case of lawnmowers, typically, the deck itself and the handles are made in-house from incoming materials, the deck painted in the factory. The rest of the componentry arrives ready-made and is assembled and then packaged for delivery.

Production facilities in this industry are usually located on the outer perimeters of metropolitan areas. Large component producers like Briggs & Stratton have very extensive and well-developed supply chains so that a producer has ready access to engines or parts located anywhere near a reasonably-sized city. In that steel products—of which steel sheet represents the largest percentage followed by stampings and forgings, as shown by Census Bureau data—are the largest inputs next to engines and engine components, from a logistical vantage point location in the vicinity of a steel distribution center is ideal for lawn and garden tool producers.

DISTRIBUTION CHANNEL

Based on surveys of producers conducted by the Outdoor Power Equipment Institute, the United States was a net exporter of lawn and garden tools in 2000 by a substantial margin. In that year domestic producers exported $867 million in such goods while imports amounted to $359 million—for a rare foreign trade surplus of just over half a billion dollars. The highest export rates were achieved by producers of commercial turf equipment (who exported 32.9% of their production) and hand-held equipment makers (33.6%), approximately one-third of their ship-ments. In the consumer products category 10.4 percent of goods made went into foreign markets. Canada purchased the largest share of exports.

Producers in this industry use both two- and three-tier distribution. In the first case goods move from the producer directly to the retailer and then to the customer, be that consumer a member of the public or an institutional buyer. In doing its distribution analysis, OPEI established five categories of identified buyers. These were: (1) small retailers, (2) general merchandise, hardware, and auto chains, (3) discount houses, (4) home improvement, home center, and building supply stores, (5) wholesalers/distributors, and (6) a very small Other category. The first four are different kinds of retail operation. If the results for these categories are combined, one sees that commercial lawn and garden tool producers, (but excluding hand-held goods) sold 84.8 percent of their goods directly into the retail channel, suggesting the dominance of the two-tier distribution system. This was also true of producers of hand-held tools who sold 84 percent of their product directly to the retail channel and commercial turf maintenance equipment builders who sold 81 percent of products directly to retail stores. Wholesaler/distributor participation was thus relatively minor in this industry, amounting to 13.6 percent for commercial, 15.2 percent for hand-held, and 16.4 percent for professional tools. The rest went into the Other channel. A surprisingly large proportion of product went to small retailers with fewer than fifteen stores each. In the consumer sector, 33.8 percent went to such stores; in the hand-held sector, 29.2 percent, and in the commercial turf maintenance sector a very high 79.8 percent. These percentages are net of exports, and thus reflect only domestic sales.

The predominance of small retailers reflects the fact that many of the leading firms have endeavored to develop their own dealer networks; some directly own such retail outlets. Direct sales are also driven by decades-long consolidation in the retail sector and the development of very large chain stores. These operations buy product under contract directly from producers and thus bypass the intervening wholesale channel. Distributors typically handle the more expensive products like lawn and garden tractors and also sell these to their networks of small independent dealers. In the consumer sector just over half of the product made (51%) and in the hand-held sector a slightly higher proportion (54.8%) is sold to large chains. In commercial turf maintenance sector an insignificant portion (1.2%) reaches chains.

KEY USERS

Key users of lawn and garden tools are homeowners, accounting for 81 percent of the market. The remaining 19 percent of production is purchased by institutional buyers. These buyers may be divided into: (1) commercial service organizations that use such equipment to deliver services to others, not least homeowners; (2) rental organizations who offer such equipment on a short-term-use basis; (3) institutional facility operators who employ staffs to maintain extensive terrains, including owners of golf courses, recreational areas, resorts, ball parks, industrial parks, hotels with extensive grounds, cemeteries, and owners or managers of similar facilities; and (4), most likely the largest market for commercial equipment, the public sector comprising such units as towns, cities, counties, highway departments, port authorities, park and forest services, elements of State and Federal governments, and, indeed, any agency responsible for the management of public lands.

Key users may also be defined by the surface area of the lawn requiring servicing. Users of walk-behind lawn-mowers typically have modestly sized lawns less than half of an acre in extent. Homeowners with half an acre and up to two acres may use riding mowers or lawn tractors if the terrain permits their easy use. Garden tractors are usually deployed on lawns of two acres or greater. These, of course, are rules of thumb applicable to the household where one person will typically do the yard work. In institutional settings, equipment of all sizes may be employed. Thus a large crew using industrial-grade push mowers may be utilized or, depending on terrain, one or two large devices may be used. Service organizations working on residential estates typically arrive with one or two large self-propelled machines, several push mowers, and assorted hand-held equipment. Three or more laborers will fan out to do work, each person doing a different job.

ADJACENT MARKETS

Adjacent markets may be viewed as products adjacent to the core tools described here, thus lesser tools and greater tools. Using that point of view, non-powered tools represent one extreme. In the 1950s and earlier periods, the majority of homeowners used rotary push-mowers entirely powered by human muscle. Such equipment is not only still available but growing in popularity in that segment of the market interested in environmental issues, good exercise, relative silence, and possibly nostalgia and memories of having done grandma's or the neighbor lady's yard as a teenager. At the other extreme, beyond the commercial turf maintenance equipment, farm machinery represents equipment functionally equivalent to lawn and garden tools but writ large.

Another view of adjacency is to ask, What competes with what? In the early twenty-first century, with the most populous generation of the United States getting ever older—the Baby Boom generation—the aging population itself is influencing markets adjacent to particular slices of lawn and garden tooling. For instance, power-driven tillers are favored by people still eager to prepare their own garden soil but with less physical effort. In adopting powered-equipment, such people displace non-powered hand tools. The relative growth in riding equipment is in part due to people seeking greater comfort, in part due to trends in residential construction: new construction has featured progressively increasing square footage; such housing is often sited on greater acreage as well. The shift toward riding mowers has reduced demand for walk-behind mowers. Landscaping may be viewed as an adjacent market in those cases where people reorganize their lawns, replacing grass with shrubbery, ground cover, and flower beds—thus eliminating the need to mow.

Paralleling the aging of the baby boom has been increasing participation by women in the work force and thus a reduction in the time families can devote to housekeeping chores. The two trends have converged and have lead to the increased use of professional lawn care services, itself an adjacent market—although, of course, a market that itself uses the higher end of the lawn and garden equipment. This is reflected in greater growth experienced by commercial turf equipment over walk-behind lawnmowers. Elderly people, even with small yards, engage professionals to mow and fertilize their lawns and to clear away snow in the winter. Working couples busy conveying children to multiple outside activities have less time; some have opted to hand over routine lawn chores to companies that do the work when no one is home.

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT

Significant research and development efforts have gone into making gasoline engines used in lawn and garden equipment compliant with Environmental Protection Agency regulations. This effort has been on-going since the 1990s, but has not ended as the twenty-first century marches on. The State of California, traditionally a leader in prodding and leading the nation to achieve ever higher air purity (motivated by West Coast smog), has issued more stringent regulations under the auspices of its California Air Resources Board (CARB) applicable to all equipment sold in the state. Leading engine makers are conformant to both EPA and CARB rules. Efforts in this direction have focused on improved carburetion to minimize the emission of carbon monoxide and unburned hydrocarbons, reduced surface areas within the combustion chamber itself, helpful in reducing hydrocarbon emissions, and improved control of oil so that less of it is burned in the combustion chamber, reducing smoke—a particular problem in the more powerful 2-cycle engines that burn a gas-oil mixture. Greater fuel efficiency is another R&D goal in part motivated by environmental concerns: the less fuel combusted, the less pollution; attempts in this direction also provide a consumer benefit. Attempts at complying with environmental regulations have raised engine prices because it is easier to comply with carbureted engines, thus by using more expensive 4-cycle engines.

A significant irritation for the user of powered-equipment is the effort required to get the smaller engines started. A good deal of R&D effort has gone into giving consumers easy-to-start engines. Briggs & Stratton, for example, features three different engine types that accomplish this end, called ReadyStart, FreshStart, and Z-Start. Better engine shielding to reduce noise and lighter engines to make hand-held devices easier to use are also under continuous development.

Powered lawn and garden tools can injure users if they are improperly operated. Producers and industry groups in the lawn and garden industry are expending continuous R&D effort to achieve higher safety in two ways: through the tightening and refinement of safety standards and their implementation in actual equipment designs.

Rather exotic R&D is also underway in this industry and may, in the longer term, become widely applied. One example is an effort by Udi Peless and Shai Abramson, two Israeli engineers, to market their invention, RoboMower, a completely automated, electrically driven lawn mower so independent that, once programmed, it can undock itself from its charging station, mow the lawn every week, and then return to its dock to replenish its batteries. The device is on sale in the United States through Sears.com. Lest it be thought that RoboMower is an absolutely unique product, there is also the automatic LawnBott offered by Kyodo America Industries Co. Ltd. LawnBott is guided by a perimeter cable defining the area it is supposed to mow. It detects its own boundaries by communicating with the cable. If its owner wishes to dispense with the cable, a well-defined fence will do as well. LawnBott sells for $1,849 and is made in Italy.

CURRENT TRENDS

The predominant trend in the mature lawn and garden tools industry is slow growth, stability, incremental technological change, corporate consolidation, and possibly a tendency by product users to replace lower-value with higher-value equipment, the last trend in part dictated by environmental pressures. This is an industry still dominated by U.S. manufacturers who export more of their product than they import, with a handful of major producers enjoying a global market. In general, one might say, the industry reflects the nature of the plant it is primarily intended to manage—the grass: it comes in its season and, at regular intervals, grows dormant, to reemerge again as green as before.

The industry underwent some competitive turbulence in the 1970s and 1980s with the entry of Japanese companies into the market, most notably Honda. However, with Honda's centralization of its small engine and lawn and garden tools manufacturing in the United States, U.S. manufacturing dominance has not been affected. Entry into the tools segment by the leading engine producer, Briggs & Stratton has transformed the once hierarchical character of this industry—its division into engine-producing and equipment-producing halves. Consolidation has reduced the number of companies, but the proliferation of many distinct brands has remained.

TARGET MARKETS & SEGMENTATION

In the lawn and garden tools sector, the product itself actually defines its own market and segment. Thus, for example, low-cost lawnmowers are targeted for the low end of the consumer market and are treated as commodities. The addition of features—such as, for lawn mowers, bigger engines, mulching features, glass-catching equipment, self-propelled walk-behinds—are intended for the higher end of the market and expected to appeal to those seeking ease, comfort, or even prestige. Lawn work frequently performed by males and thus the old adage "the bigger the boy the bigger the toy" applies in this industry. Riding mowers, lawn tractors, and garden tractors are in part targeted to appeal to the male ego—and, indeed, are often purchased for uses on quite small properties if the egos are big enough. Commercial equipment, in turn, is targeted to buyers who view the equipment in terms of equipment life, efficiency, and economy of use.

RELATED ASSOCIATIONS & ORGANIZATIONS

American Society of Agricultural Engineers, http://www.asae.org

Equipment Engine Training Council, http://www.eetc.org

Lawn and Garden Dealers Association, http://www.lgda.com

North American Equipment Dealers Association, http://www.naeda.com

Outdoor Power Equipment Aftermarket Association, http://www.opeaa.org

Outdoor Power Equipment & Engine Service Association, http://www.opeesa.com

Outdoor Power Equipment Institute, http://www.opei.mow.org

The Professional Landcare Network -PLANET, http://www.landcarenetwork.org

Professional Lawn Care Association of America, http://www.plcaa.org

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Darnay, Arsen J. and Joyce P. Simkin. Manufacturing & Distribution USA, 4th ed. Thomson Gale, 2006, Volume 2, 1029-1033.

DeRosa, Angie. "Hardware Show Abounds with Innovation." Plastics News. 29 May 2006.

Lazich, Robert S. Market Share Reporter 2007. Thomson Gale, 2007.

Murray, Charles J. "Mowing on Autopilot." Design News. 26 June 2006.

"Product Summary: 2002." 2002 Economic Census. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census. March 2006.

Profile of the Outdoor Power Equipment Industry 2002. Outdoor Power Equipment Institute. Old Town Alexandria, Virginia. Undated.

"The Share-of-Market Picture for 2005." Appliance Magazine. September 2006.

see also Hand Tools, Construction Machinery