City’s Biggest Scaffolding Supplier Drops Rents by 25 Percent

Everest Scaffolding, one of the largest suppliers of sidewalk sheds and pipe scaffolding in New York City, announced Thursday that it is giving all of its clients, including numerous co-op and condo boards, a 25 percent discount on their rental charges during the month of April, while all non-essential construction work is shut down by executive order from Gov. Andrew Cuomo. The company will address the issue again on May 1 and decide if the discount will be continued, based on the progress in slowing the spread of the deadly coronavirus and the state of the city’s construction industry.

“We’ve been getting calls from our co-op and condo clients to ask what we could do to alleviate the pressure on them,” says Jimmy Downes, president of Bronx-based Everest Scaffolding, which currently has its equipment at more than 1,000 sites across the city. “I was hoping we could do more (than a 25 percent discount),” he adds, “but the insurance costs in our industry are ridiculous.”

In an open letter addressed to “Customers, Clients, Industry Partners and Friends,” Downes wrote that he and his staff had discussed waiving all rents during the construction slowdown. “We had pondered this over the past few days,” Downes wrote. “My team reminded me of the insurance premium and permits that we just had to renew and pay for, the leasing costs and depreciation/weathering of all the miles and miles of bridging and the levels and levels of pipe scaffolding in place we have to pay for. This brought us to the decision we could not just waive all rental fees.”

Downes says he hopes his example will catch on throughout the city’s billion-dollar scaffold industry. “I’m hoping my friends and competitors will follow suit,” he says. “We’re all in the same situation.”