Pay for the virus and lockdown: new furniture price tags shock Russian buyers

Sergey Viktorov

Just yesterday evening, the author of these lines ordered an office sofa for 15 thousand, having made an application on the website of a furniture enterprise in the Moscow region. On Monday morning, the sales manager sent a shocking response:

"Good day, Sergey!

Due to the rise in prices for upholstery materials last week, work is underway on our sites to update the prices. The cost of the sofa ... t the moment with a discount is 21,200 rubles. We apologize, but we are forced to raise the price after the manufacturer did it".

A simple calculation shows that the new price is 40 percent higher than the old one! Has galloping inflation started in Russia? Manufacturers have conspired to finish off the last buyers, who still has money for furniture?

Manager Yekaterina replied in the second letter:

"...some manufacturers even had a two-fold increase in a month. Others have increased by 130% since September. Alas, we can’t do anything. But we try to offer the lowest price. The manufacturer of this sofa model has been holding back prices for a very long time, but for Last week we received new figures. Yes, we have a large assortment, there are cabinet furniture, accessories, etc. And all this is becoming more expensive ... The work on the site with prices does not stop".

130 percent in just 9 months is more than an order of magnitude higher than the official inflation in Russia, which is allegedly measured by Rosstat and the relevant ministry. So, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, in the first quarter of 2021, the average price for furniture increased by 12%, the internal price for particleboard - by 23%, and export - by 49%. In 2020, due to the coronavirus, particleboard production decreased by 1.5%, while exports increased by 16%.

It is obvious that manufacturers of components (first of all, chipboards) have reoriented themselves to foreign markets, and for domestic consumption they align prices with export contracts. Metallurgists did the same before.

In response, the Ministry of Industry and Trade proposes to prohibit the export of chipboard (particle board) from July 1 to December 31, 2021. The draft resolution has been published on the official portal of regulatory legal acts.

"To establish from July 1, 2021 to December 31, 2021, a temporary ban on the export of chipboards from the Russian Federation, which are essential goods for the domestic market of the Russian Federation", - the draft document says.

Since September 2020, "an explosive growth in demand for furniture products" began, as a result of which the volume of production increased by 52%, and the demand of enterprises for particleboard increased by 39%, according to the explanatory note to the project.

The conclusion is simple: until the demand for furniture products abroad is saturated, there is no need to wait for the stabilization of prices for furniture in Russia. So it is worth buying furniture right now - as long as the stores have stocks at the old prices.