“Do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.”
– Benjamin Franklin One more time with feeling
Business expansion is a good thing. Business expansion within our region is a very good thing. And business expansion within our region, when one alternative is to pack up and move out of Charlotte USA, is a great thing – even if it means that a company moves from one Charlotte USA county to another. Of course, it is optimal when companies can expand within the communities where they are located. However, sometimes it doesn’t work out that way. There might be workforce or space or land or bottom line considerations. Last week, two companies announced they would move from one Charlotte USA county to another. Liburdi Dimetrics will move its 80-employee headquarters from Mecklenburg to Iredell County, and Red Ventures’ headquarters and its 250 employees will move about four miles down the road from Mecklenburg to Lancaster County. Both moved to expand their businesses. Not only will there be no job loss, but more money will be invested in our region - $6 million in Iredell and $20 million in Lancaster. Red Ventures also will hire up to 750 more people, 100 of them before the end of the year. It’s been a rough year with thousands of jobs lost, and news that our local businesses are growing is welcome news indeed. However, I’ve seen headlines and read reports that talk about cross-border rivalry. I guess I need to review the Charlotte Regional Partnership’s mission. We are a public/private economic development organization with the sole mission of marketing our 16-county (two-state) region as an exceptional place to do business. Each month, the Partnership’s staff and the economic developers from each of our counties get together to talk about how we can better recruit companies and serve our existing industries. Every one of these counties invests in the Partnership because they believe that together – as a region, we can maximize our competitiveness to attract and retain investment and employment. Regardless of where an individual project lands, we all ultimately benefit by working together. Mecklenburg, Iredell and Lancaster all are within the “borders” of Charlotte USA. Neither Iredell nor Lancaster tried to do an end run to snag the two companies that will move there. The companies approached them. When it became apparent that the businesses were going to move, Iredell and Lancaster economic developers did the only responsible thing: They went for it. It is a tribute to our region that both Liburdi Dimetrics and Red Ventures chose to expand their companies within Charlotte USA. According to the Ticknor report that the Charlotte Regional Partnership commissioned in 2006, this sort of “job decentralization” is a perceptual problem, not an economic hardship. People and organizations that fan the flames of rivalry do a disservice to our region. Our time is better spent developing our workforce, building infrastructure, encouraging entrepreneurship and becoming more competitive within our target sectors: financial services, energy/environment, defense/aerospace, health/biotech, motorsports and film. As the Ticknor report concluded, “It is time to renew our efforts to grow the regional pie, not just argue about its distribution.”
Locations, expansions, contractions
The International Business Park at Concord has a new tenant. Florida-based CBLPath, which provides lab-test services has opened a 2,500-square-foot office with a 10-person marketing and sales staff. Its local presence could grow to a 50,000-square-foot laboratory in the coming years.
Siemens Energy broke ground on its new $50 million, 60,000-square-foot LEED certified building. Earlier this year, the company had announced the expansion, which is next to its Charlotte manufacturing plant. The company plans to add more than 200 jobs. A vacant 96,000-square-foot big box in Kannapolis will have a new life. Rug and Home has bought the old Target store and will begin a $750,000 retrofit and upgrade to transform the property into Rug and Home Warehouse Outlet, a distribution center, warehouse and retail store, which will open early next year. The company, which plans to hire between 40 and 75 people, also will move its headquarters to Kannapolis. A property in Chester County also got a second chance. Kinro, a subsidiary of Drew Industries Inc., which supplies components for recreational vehicles and manufactured homes, has purchased some of the inventory and equipment from Philips Products, Inc., which closed in July. Kinro plans to hire some workers and begin manufacturing at the plant within 30 days.
Have a great week!
 Ronnie L. Bryant, CEcD, FM, HLM
President & CEO |
