About SMU

 

Our Story

John_Green_Coils.jpgA steel veteran of over 30 years, John Packard founded Steel Market Update in 2008 to give others in the steel industry real-time pricing, trends, and valuable market information that would help them as they go about making business decisions. It was his tremendous experience and abundance of steel contacts that helped him start Steel Market Update.

 

After 2008, SMU expanded their services by including other steel-experienced writers, more industry coverage such as our proprietary SMU Steel Buyers Sentiment Index, along with workshops and conferences to help others gain knowledge about the steel market. As an independent company, we offer unbiased and objective information
                                        to our readers.

Our Vision

We want to Inform, Educate, and Motivate others in the steel industry to become well-informed and productive steel industry participants. Steel Market Update will do this by providing and analyzing real-time pricing, market trends, and relevant information related to the North American flat rolled steel market.

Key Products & Services:

  • A newsletter & website dedicated to the North American flat rolled steel market
  • Current/historical pricing for hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume steels
  • SMU Steel Buyers Sentiment index which measures current attitudes of active buyers and sellers of flat rolled steel products – both manufacturers and distributors
  • SMU Steel Price Momentum indicator (located on home page) follows market trends and projects the most likely direction of future flat rolled steel prices
  • Steel Blog gives you the latest news and price announcements, along with interaction
  • Research center including a steel glossary, indexes, calculations, conversion charts, etc.
  • Flat rolled steel prime Price Estimator based on our current steel index pricing and domestic mill extras
  • Events section that houses our upcoming training seminars and conferences
  • Newsletter archives which are searchable

Contact Us

Click Here to use our contact form or email: info@steelmarketupdate.com or call: 706-216-5440 / 800-432-3475 (U.S. ET zone)

*If you would like to see membership options and pricing, CLICK HERE


 

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Kataman Metals Kataman Metals
“I have known John Packard for more than 25 years. We have worked together as colleagues. He was a galvanized supplier to my company for 11 years - or longer. I watched John develop his newsletter in the early 1990's when we worked together at Pacesetter Steel Service, Inc. where he produced Galvanized Steel Update. Once John started Paragon Metal Services, Inc. it was only a matter of time before he felt the need to keep his clients informed about steel pricing, market momentum and why events were happening. His foresight saved us a lot of money and has allowed our company to grow and prosper over the years. As long as there is a steel business there needs to be a quality publication like Steel Market Update to keep the playing field level and the competition honest.” – Earl Goode Kenwood Painted Metals