Piper Reports a 75 Percent Increase in Aircraft Sales Compared to Last Year

Piper Aircraft reported more than a 75 percent increase in sales of their aircraft in 2010. According to numbers released Tuesday morning by the General Aviation Manufacturers Association, billing for aircraft shipped went from $86 million in 2009 to nearly $120.2 million last year, an increase of nearly 38 percent. "Piper Aircraft is very pleased with 2010 progress and performance in terms of market penetration, deliveries and dollar volume," said Piper Chief Executive Officer Geoffrey Berger in a company release. "The increases reflected our aggressive efforts toward globalizing the profile of the company. In a very challenging year for our overall industry, Piper demonstrated measurable improvement in all meaningful categories." "We are trying to do more build-to-order rather than speculating and hoping we get the deal," said Groom. In the fourth quarter of last year, the company shipped 53 airplanes at a total price of $42.6 million compared with 21 aircraft valued at $18.8 million in the last quarter of 2009. In the third quarter of 2010, the company shipped 32 airplanes with a total price of $28.1 million. Groom said that while 2010 was a tough year, the company did manage to hit its target in the latter part of the year, including a few additional deliveries that came in under the wire. Piper reported that deliveries of 47 training aircraft to pilot training institutions in Australia, Malaysia, South Korea, Qatar, and the U.S. as a primary reason for its resurgence. He said despite the pain caused by the downturn, 'we are now seeing strong GDP (gross domestic product) growth on a global level and corporate profits are up. This bodes well for general aviation's future as shipments have traditionally lagged an economic recovery by one or two years."