Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International (HARDI) released its monthly TRENDS report, showing sales by HARDI distributors increased by 7.6% during August 2026.

The annual sales growth for the 12 months through July 2026 is an increase of 3.4%.

“July and August were the best back-to-back sales growth since late 2022 after the sales growth peaked,” said Brian Loftus, senior market analyst at HARDI. “The 7.6% gain this month was helped by warmer than normal temps against below normal temps in most regions last August.”  

HARDI’s monthly distributor sales survey also calculates Days Sales Outstanding or DSO which is a measure of how quickly customers pay their bills. The DSO for August 2026 was less than 37 days which is about the same as July, and comparable to July and August last summer. “The DSO is not indicating any market stress. We expect it to increase the next few months as part of the normal seasonality.”

“It is nice to see a couple of good months of sales growth,” Loftus said. “That is a more encouraging headline than the increasing inflation and interest rates.”