Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. (Operator instructions) Your first question comes from Chris Ferrara with Merrill Lynch.
Chris Ferrara – Merrill Lynch
I just wanted to ask – Pat, you were talking about us seeing and other people seeing possibly a bottoming out of the economy, you said you are not ready to make that call. I’m just wondering is that because you are not seeing it in your end markets or is it because maybe you are seeing it, but you really don’t want to base anything on one quarter as worth of seeing it or one month worth of seeing it?
Mark Ketchum
Chris, let me take that one. The answer is we are not seeing a strong enough indication across the big enough portion of our portfolio to make that call. So, the evidence is still too spotty.
Chris Ferrara – Merrill Lynch
Okay. And I just – I guess real quickly on gross margin – I mean, so obviously you are up pretty nicely this quarter relatively to where I guess we think you would have come in. I guess simply, is there any structural reason why Q4 gross margins in the business would be lower than any other quarter across the businesses? I’m just looking at that 30% that you guys put up last quarter and obviously, there was a lot going on in the December quarter of ’08 versus the 35% we saw in the December quarter of ’07. So just – I guess simply stated, structurally is there any reason why that – why Q4 would be lower than every other quarter?
Pat Robinson
No, there is not.
Mark Ketchum
I think fourth quarter of last year was specifically impacted by – as we saw the rather sudden decline in November and December, we reacted in our manufacturing locations and starting shutting down production and obviously that affected our ability to absorb some of the costs.
Pat Robinson
There was also some inventory write-downs we took in the quarter that affected fourth quarter of ’08 that were sort of one-time in nature.
Chris Ferrara – Merrill Lynch
Great. Thanks guys, I appreciate it.
Operator
Your next question comes from Joe Altobello with Oppenheimer.
Joe Altobello – Oppenheimer
Hi guys, good morning. The first question – I just wanted to follow up on Chris’ question on the gross margin. When do we start to see the commodity costs pullback really push gross margin higher, is it 2Q or 3Q or are we starting to see that already?
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