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Economic Development
 
Reno’s Beauty Not Just Skin-Deep for Cosmetics Manufacturer  [ 5/12/2009 ] By: Josh Cable
  Scienceuticals Inc., a New York City-based contract manufacturer of cosmetics and skin-care products, recently opened a new 55,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Reno, Nev.   Read The Full Article

Mead Johnson to Open New Corporate Office in Chicago Area  [ 5/5/2009 ] By: Josh Cable
  Mead Johnson Nutrition Co., an Evansville, Ind.-based maker of baby formula and other children’s nutritional products, plans to open a new corporate office in the Chicago suburb of Glenview, Ill., thanks to $2.7 million in incentives offered by the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.   Read The Full Article

Ohio Aims to Make Location Analysis Easier with New Web Site  [ 4/30/2009 ] By: Josh Cable
  Ohio officials are hoping that a new Web site dedicated to attracting capital investment and site selection opportunities will give the Buckeye State a competitive edge in this global economy.   Read The Full Article

Michigan Aims to Become ‘Advanced-Battery Capital of the World’  [ 4/16/2009 ] By: Josh Cable
  Kentucky isn’t the only state making a concerted effort to create a hub for advanced-battery manufacturing. In Michigan, Gov. Jennifer Granholm recently announced that the Wolverine State has wooed four companies that plan to invest more than $1.7 billion to launch facilities that will manufacture lithium-ion batteries – thanks to millions of dollars in refundable tax credits offered by the state.   Read The Full Article

Smithfield Foods To Shutter Plants in Six States  [ 2/19/2009 ] By: News Brief
  SMITHFIELD, Va. (Feb. 19) — Pork producer Smithfield Foods Inc. will close six factories and cut 1,800 jobs as part of a restructuring initiative.   Read The Full Article

2007 METRO PUBLIC SCHOOLS QUOTIENT: Building Tomorrow’s Work Force  [ 12/17/2007 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor  Related Link...
  Click on "Related Link" to read the PRESS RELEASE

The future quality of a metro area’s work force is being shaped today by its public schools. Just how good are they?   Read The Full Article


2007 LEGISLATIVE QUOTIENT: When Shaping the Business Climate, Numbers Speak Louder Than Words  [ 12/17/2007 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Our 12th annual Legislative Quotient™ examines the impact each of the 50 individual state legislatures have on local business climates.   Read The Full Article

North Carolina Court of Appeals Decision Upholds Dell Incentives   [ 10/26/2007 ] By: NEWS BRIEFS
  RALEIGH, N.C. (October 26, 2007) — The ruling is a critical acknowledgment of the importance of the state or local jurisdictions to be able to use incentives as a tool to attract new and expanding businesses.   Read The Full Article

2007 WORK FORCE TRAINING: Expanding Companies Come To Depend on State Work Force Training Programs  [ 8/16/2007 ] By: Ken Krizner, Managing Editor
  The demand for a quick ROI in a new facility means that it is imperative that a company's work force is highly trained from the first day of operations.   Read The Full Article

2007 TOP CITIES FOR BUSINESS ATTRACTION: These Communities Are Literally Magnets for Business  [ 6/28/2007 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor  Related Link...
  Click on "Related Link" to read PRESS RELEASE

Expansion Management and the National Policy Research Council looked at the facility relocation activity of 19 million companies over the past eight years to determine the most popular destinations for relocating businesses.   Read The Full Article


The Internet Makes Gathering Site Location Information Easier  [ 12/21/2006 ] By: Ken Krizner, Managing Editor
  Expanding companies can use the Internet to quickly gather relevant information that is critical to a successful site location search.   Read The Full Article

2006 MAYOR'S CHALLENGE: Where Are the Best Metros for Future Business Locations?  [ 8/15/2006 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor  Related Link...
  For PRESS RELEASE, click on "Related Link"

Expansion Management's 4th annual Mayor's Challenge is our "Best of the Best" ranking of metro areas that have achieved solid ratings across the board in our numerous studies during the past 12 months.   Read The Full Article


How to Ensure Your Company Makes the Best Site Location Choice  [ 5/8/2006 ] By: Ken Krizner, Managing Editor
  Expanding companies should follow an orderly process to ensure that their search will yield the most advantageous location.   Read The Full Article

Economic Development Incentives Are A Two-Way Street  [ 10/11/2005 ] By: Rachael Hedgcoth
  Expanding companies may get the financial perks they seek if the project fits what a community wants.   Read The Full Article

GUEST VIEWPOINT: Supreme Court’s Decision on Kelo Was Correct  [ 10/11/2005 ] By: Jeff Finkle, CEcD
  Ruling supports the idea that eminent domain is a critical economic development tool.   Read The Full Article

In Business Attraction, Know Your Strengths  [ 9/7/2005 ] By: Gordon Sloagett and Mike D. Woods
  When trying to attract industry to your region, you have to know what would be your community’s greatest assets to an expanding company.   Read The Full Article

The Challenges and Rewards of Revitalizing Older Industrial Cities  [ 9/5/2005 ] By: David Soule, Joan Fitzgerald and Barry Bluestone
  There are plenty of obstacles, but also plenty of opportunities to reinvigorate the urban core.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Why Do Some Communities Lose Businesses, While Others Don’t?  [ 9/5/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Rather than looking at others for the answer, a better place to start would be to look in the mirror.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: What's the "Dirty Little Secret" Most Chambers of Commerce Try to Hide?  [ 8/10/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Many local economic developers are afraid (or embarrassed) to admit that they have any vacant buildings because they fear businesses will think there is something wrong with their community. Are they nuts?   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: When it Comes to Eminent Domain, Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should  [ 7/11/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision on eminent domain for economic development could hurt public support for those programs.   Read The Full Article

2005 KNOWLEDGE WORKER QUOTIENT ™: America’s Super Cities of the Future  [ 5/12/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor, and Michael Keating, Senior Research Editor  Related Link...
  Click on Related Link for PRESS RELEASE

Our third annual Knowledge Worker Quotient ™ identifies metro areas that are exceptionally well placed to attract and nurture high-tech companies and entrepreneurs because of their concentration of extremely well educated workers.   Read The Full Article


COMMENTARY: Education Is the Key to Success in the Knowledge Economy  [ 5/12/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Most employers will look to hire the smartest workers they can find at a price they can afford. It’s really a matter of supply and demand.   Read The Full Article

Base Closures Can Present Opportunities for Business Growth  [ 5/12/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Communities around the country now must take a negative — the closure of a local military base — and try to turn it into a positive.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: What the Heck Is Economic Development?  [ 4/14/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Is economic development just another form of corporate welfare, or is it simply a way to help businesses streamline government bureaucracy?   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: 11 Tips for Picking the Right Location for a Manufacturing Facility  [ 4/13/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Once it’s time to actually start looking at the real estate, here are some important questions you need to ask before you decide on a specific building or piece of land. Hopefully, the local economic developer or real estate broker has done his homework.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: The War Against Incentives Rages On  [ 2/14/2005 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Financial incentives granted to DaimlerChrysler and Dell for major facility expansions are creating quite a stir among opponents of the incentives issue.   Read The Full Article

2004 LEGISLATIVE QUOTIENT ™: Is Your State Government Helping to Create a Competitive Business Climate?  [ 12/5/2004 ] By: Bill King  Related Link...
  Click on related link to view PRESS RELEASE.

Expansion Management’s 10th annual Legislative Quotient™ compares the business climates created by each of the 50 state legislatures.   Read The Full Article


COMMENTARY: Economic Development Is Really About Optimism  [ 11/1/2004 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Business attraction and retention efforts are, at their heart, about the survival of one’s community.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Why Downtowns Are Losing Out to the Suburbs  [ 10/30/2004 ] By: Bill King
  Unless we fix our large urban school districts, our cities will continue to lose out economically to the suburbs. Why? Because businesses go where the best work force is.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Is Economic Development Really a “Public Use”?  [ 10/5/2004 ] By: Bill King
  Should a local government, under the guise of economic development, be able to use its powers of eminent domain to take property from one private party and give it to another?   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: The Urban vs. Suburban Battle for Business  [ 10/1/2004 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Five myths about the competition between urban center and suburban economic developers.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: A Metro Area Is Really Just Like a Sports Team  [ 7/1/2004 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
 

It takes all three components — the downtown, the outlying suburbs and the unincorporated sections of the county — to make a region thrive.   Read The Full Article


COMMENTARY: Do You Really Have a Mandate for Economic Development?  [ 7/1/2004 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Even though your community is paying you a nice salary to head its local E.D. effort, are they willing to give you the resources you need to do the job well? Here are some early warning signals.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Benefiting From the Experience of Others  [ 4/1/2004 ] By: Bill King
  It seems that a week doesn’t go by without somebody calling us looking for a list. State and community economic developers want a list of what relocating companies are looking for, and relocating companies are always looking for lists on how best to navigate their way through the complex task of site selection.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Education Is the Key to Economic Prosperity  [ 3/1/2004 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Communities without a strong educational foundation — good public schools, community colleges, a local college or university — are at a severe disadvantage in the ongoing competition for good-paying jobs with a future.   Read The Full Article

2004 HEALTH QUOTIENT™: Health Care Expenses Are a Major Site Selection Factor  [ 2/2/2004 ] By: Michael Keating, Research Editor
  When it comes to health care coverage, which states offer the lowest costs, least risks and best coverage to employers?   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Perceptions Usually Reflect Hard, Cold Experience  [ 1/2/2004 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Reputations are important. Everybody knows that, especially business executives. They spend billions of dollars marketing their products in an effort to convince the marketplace that their company stands for quality and reliability, and that their products will satisfy a particular need the consuming public has.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: The Only Way to Successfully Compete Is to Be Competitive  [ 10/1/2003 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
 

If cities want to stop the outbound flow of companies, they need to forget about gimmicks and focus on improving their business climate.   Read The Full Article


COMMENTARY: OMB’s New Metro- and Micro-politan Statistical Areas Will Make Your Job Easier  [ 7/1/2003 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  New statistical designations will make gathering site selection, as well as general business and demographic, information on a particular community much simpler, providing your business with valuable business information.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: When it Comes to Marketing Your Community, Have a Take and Don’t [Be Boring]  [ 5/1/2003 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Syndicated talk show host Jim Rome’s two cardinal rules for being on his show have great applicability for those of us trying to communicate a message.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Two Heads Are Better Than One  [ 4/1/2003 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Don’t be afraid to ask for help as you work your way through the site selection process.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: How Do You Measure Success?  [ 2/1/2003 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  With business and government cutting expenses in order to make up for revenue shortfalls, and with unemployment rates still close to levels of statistical full employment, is job production still the best way to measure the success of an economic development program?   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Do You Mind if I Dance With Your Date?  [ 9/1/2002 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  You can avoid awkward social, not to mention legal, moments by finding out ahead of time what the future neighbors think of your newly proposed facility.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Is That Project Really Beneath Your [Community’s] Dignity?  [ 9/1/2002 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  During good economic times, many of us have a tendency to look down at minimum wage type of jobs as being unworthy of our community. In so doing, are we really looking after the interests of all of our constituents?   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Bad Schools Create Economic Development Nightmares  [ 7/2/2002 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  It's time to put politics aside and take personal responsibility for the success of our school districts. After all, today's students are tomorrow's work force.   Read The Full Article

Sports & Business Do Mix  [ 6/1/2002 ] By: Bill King, Editor
  One of the fiercest debates within our cities today is over the importance of sports franchises to the economic development of the metro area.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Become Your Community’s Business Ombudsman  [ 5/1/2002 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  The same knowledge and skills you use to help new companies locate into your town can also be used to help your existing businesses grow and expand as well.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Is Business Attraction Immoral?  [ 1/1/2002 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Should financial incentives be illegal, or is that just focusing on the symptoms instead of the desease?   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Learn From the Mistakes of Others  [ 8/1/2001 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Every once in a while, a visit to a declining community can provide your board members or political leaders with a wake up call on the dangers of an inactive business attraction and retention program.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: A Company Saved Is a Company Earned  [ 7/1/2001 ] By: Bill King
  To paraphrase Ben Franklin, every job or company saved from among the existing business community is one fewer job or company your local economic development organization needs to attract.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Metro Areas Are Really Just Like a Family  [ 5/1/2001 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
 

When businesses, as well as everyday people, look a city, they’re really looking at the entire metropolitan statistical area. It’s about time the individual governing bodies did the same.   Read The Full Article


COMMENTARY: Sizing up a Community’s Business Climate  [ 11/1/2000 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Here are some quick and easy ways to evaluate a community’s business climate, as well as its general suitability for your company.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Half the Battle Is In Knowing Where to Start  [ 4/1/2000 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Growth spurts, whether from kids or from businesses, require a certain amount of orientation and guidance. The problem is that you don’t have a whole lot of time to spend on the learning curve.   Read The Full Article

Behind the Numbers of a Site Location Search  [ 1/1/2000 ] By: Bill King, Editor
  Site selection boils down to comparing your company's business requirements to the strengths and weaknesses of a number of communities in order to determine the best location for your next manufacturing or distribution facility.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: How Important Is Education to Your Community’s Future?  [ 11/1/1999 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  If your local school district doesn’t compare favorably with other school districts in your region — or in your state, or even nationally — you’ve got a problem.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Can You Really Trust That Local Economic Developer?  [ 7/1/1999 ] By: Bill King, Editor
  The sooner you recognize that economic developers can be an extension of your arms and legs in the site selection process, the faster and smoother your location search will be.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: How to Understand the "Site Selection" Process  [ 1/1/1999 ] By: Bill King, Editor
  With its high stakes, finding the right relocation or expansion site for your business is not a game for the meek at heart.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: The 18-to-25 age Group Is the Key to a Region's Future Work Force  [ 9/1/1998 ] By: Bill King, Editor
  By looking closely at this key demographic, you can forecast whether or not a community will be able to support your future work force needs.   Read The Full Article

COMMENTARY: Underemployment Can Hide a Skilled Work Force  [ 1/1/1998 ] By: Bill King, Chief Editor
  Remember back when we used to consider a five percent unemployment rate to be the equivalent of statistical full employment?   Read The Full Article