Each year in March, the trucking industry comes together in Louisville, Ky., for its single largest event, the Mid-America Trucking Show (MATS). As the industry’s key event, it’s fairly common for the chief executive officers of exhibiting companies to report on recent performance and prognosticate about the year to come.
After returning to a relatively normal production level of roughly 250,000 Class 8 trucks (the industry’s bellwether) in 2012, the consensus opinion from the executives is for production to be off slightly, with estimates of between 210,000 and 240,000 units to be sold in 2013.