The Steel Framing Alliance (SFA), a trade group founded 10 years ago to promote the use of steel framing in residential and commercial construction, will hold a “10th Anniversary Dinner” celebration on Wednesday, October 1, 2008, in Baltimore, Md. The event will take place at the beginning of this year’s METALCON International, an annual trade show that brings together professionals from all areas of the metal construction industry.

The evening’s highlights will include a keynote address from Dr. Esmael Adibi, a renowned economist out of Chapman University in California, who will talk about the state of the economy and its impact on today’s construction activity. Also, the Cold-Formed Steel Engineer’s Institute (CFSEI), which serves as technical council to the SFA, will present its first annual Award for Innovative Design.

When the steel industry resolved to expand the construction marketplace for cold-formed steel by founding the SFA (then North American Steel Framing Alliance), Don Moody, SFA Board of Directors chairman, says information and resources available to the industry were almost nonexistent.

“The SFA had a big challenge in its early days. Outside of the prescriptive method and a handful of technical notes, there weren’t many resources available for someone looking to get started in the steel framing industry,” he said. “But now 10 years later, a solid infrastructure of codes, standards, design guides, training resources and a common standard for specifying and identifying steel is firmly in place. And not only have nearly half a million homes been built throughout the United States and Canada with cold-formed steel, but the industry has realized a tremendous amount of progress in using cold-formed steel framing as the main load-bearing element for mid-rise and low-rise multifamily projects.”

"The steel producers made a long-term commitment to the residential construction market when it invested in the establishment of the Steel Framing Alliance 10 years ago," said David C. Jeanes, president of American Iron and Steel Institute’s Steel Market Development Institute. "We knew that to penetrate a market of this potential would take time and persistence." AISI continues to be the principle investor in the SFA.

The SFA’s 10th anniversary dinner will begin at 6:30 p.m. with a cocktail reception, and will take place at the Hyatt Regency Baltimore, 300 Light Street.

Tickets for the dinner are on sale now, and several sponsorship opportunities are available. For more information about tickets and sponsorship packages, contact Maribeth Rizzuto, SFA Director of Education and Sustainable Construction, at (412) 521-5210 or msrizzuto@aol.com. Details are also available on the SFA’s Web site at www.steelframing.org.

Source: Steel Framing Alliance, August 15, 2008