HVACR Trends

Information to Inspire, Grow and Profit

HVAC Tariff Costs: What the Supreme Court Ruling Really Changes

The Supreme Court handed down a significant trade policy decision last week, and the headlines made it sound like relief was on the way.  For HVACR distributors, contractors, and manufacturers trying to manage HVAC tariff costs, the reality is more complicated than the news cycle suggests.  The Court struck down one major tariff mechanism.  Several others remain fully intact,…

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Where Margin Is Hiding

Distributor margin rarely disappears in one dramatic event.  It leaks.  Slowly.  Through timing gaps, unclear handoffs, and processes that span multiple departments but belong to…

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Where Margin Is Hiding

Distributor margin rarely disappears in one dramatic event.  It leaks.  Slowly.  Through timing gaps, unclear handoffs, and processes that span multiple departments but belong to none of them.  The reality is that, in many cases, it didn’t truly disappear.  If that’s true, the obvious question is: Where is the margin hiding? Scott Sinning has spent years working on exactly these…

Malco Launches MalcoEdge HVACR Refrigeration Tools

Malco Tools has announced MalcoEdge, a new line of HVACR refrigeration tools designed for technicians working in the field. The following is from Malco’s announcement. Malco Tools Introduces New MalcoEdge™ Line of HVACR Refrigeration Tools Purpose-built to support every phase of refrigeration service ANNANDALE, MINN. (Jan. 27, 2026) — Malco Tools, one of the nation’s leading solution developers and manufacturers of high-quality…

AI for HVAC Distributors: A Practical Field Guide from Pilot to Profit

For HVAC-R distributors dealing with margin pressure, labor constraints, and increasingly complex quoting environments, AI is rapidly moving from curiosity to operational necessity. After nearly a year of research, interviews, and vendor evaluations, I am pleased to announce the release of The AI-Enabled Distributor: From Pilot to Profit: A Field Guide written specifically for distribution executives. This is not another…

Honeywell Q4 2025 Earnings Summary

Strong Order Growth and Record Backlog Accelerating, Separation Tracking Ahead of Schedule Honeywell Q4 earnings reflect a company in transition, posting strong results while preparing for a major restructuring in 2026.  Now headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, Honeywell is a multinational conglomerate known for its building technologies, aerospace systems, materials, and safety and productivity solutions.  The company reported Q4 2025…

What Lennox’s Low Bar Tells Us About the HVAC Market Bottom

If you spent 2025 watching orders slow, inventory stack up, and replacement demand stall, you already know it was one of the most challenging HVAC markets in over a decade.  The question now is whether we have finally hit the HVAC market bottom, or whether there is more pain ahead.  Lennox’s Q4 results and 2026 guidance give us something concrete…

Women in HVACR Leadership Team Takes Shape for 2026

The HVACR industry talks constantly about workforce shortages, but too many of those conversations skip past one of the clearest opportunities sitting right in front of us.  Women make up roughly 3% of the HVACR workforce.  That number has barely moved in years.  If you want to solve the talent problem, you have to widen the pipeline, and Women in…

Smart HVAC/R Systems: Convenience or Creepy?

The HVAC/R industry crossed a line without much debate. Smart HVAC privacy wasn’t on the agenda when connected thermostats and cloud-based controllers became standard. The focus was efficiency, remote access, and fewer callbacks. But modern systems don’t just control temperature. They collect data. Occupancy patterns, schedules, runtime behavior, user access logs. The equipment we sell now knows things about the…

AI for Distributors: Supporting the Entire Sales Team

The conversation around this approach has moved past the question of whether to adopt it. The real question now is how to deploy AI for distributors in a way that actually supports the people doing the work. Too many solutions focus on one slice of the sales process while ignoring the rest. That approach creates silos, not scale. Jason Sullivan…