"So, all in all, we cover every segment of the market, all the way from folddown camping trailers clear up through Coachman RV company's highline product which is sold and marketed under the name of Destiny." It's interesting that Coachmen chose modular housing rather than manufactured housing like many other companies whose core business is RVs. Manufactured housing construction incorporates some of the same manufacturing techniques as recreation vehicles so that business is a natural spin off for many RV manufacturers. Corson explained, "Modular housing is different than the mobile home or typical manufactured home built on steel frames or built to HUD codes. Our modular homes are all wooden frame construction, just like any home built on site, and they all go on foundations that are all built to state and local codes. That's the pure modular home." Coachmen is the largest modular home builder in the country. Corson said, "I can't give you an exact number of how many pure modular home companies there are, because the numbers within the housing industry are not clear. We did $83 million in modular homes last year and the closest competitor was about $41-42 million volume. This was done basically with two plants and a third one that was just barely getting underway, and a fourth one that we've just finished construction of last May. So, for 1996, we have nearly twice the capacity and manufacturing space as we had in 1995. We're quite optimistic that we will continue to make good gains wherever these modular home products are exposed. They have begun to gain in popularity, so we're very comfortable in that facet of our business."
|
