When Randy Jackson first moved back to Georgia in 2007, he remembers being able to park anywhere he wanted in downtown West Point. Troup County had seen a rash of textile plant closings in recent years. Local residents and businesses were suffering.
“Now I have to hunt for a parking place, and often I’m parking several blocks away and walking to my destination,” said Jackson, director of human resources at Kia Motors Manufacturing Georgia.
What made the difference? In a word: Kia. When the South Korean automaker decided to locate a new plant in West Point, it brought with it new jobs and economic development. Macon-born Randy Jackson, who had worked out of the state for 25 years, was the first person hired.
“Having an opportunity to come back to my home state and work on a large project like this was very exciting,” said Jackson.
Kia has invested approximately $1 billion in its first U.S. auto facility and hired 2,200 employees. It expects to add another 800 by year’s end.
Suppliers to the manufacturer and its sister Hyundai plant in Montgomery, Ala., have brought about another 7,000 jobs to the area, said Jackson. West Point and LaGrange have seen new hotels and restaurants spring up, as well as a Wal-Mart distribution center. Columbus State University opened a branch campus in West Point, and Atlanta Christian College has plans to move its institution there in 2012.
“The mayor of West Point recently told me that 38 new businesses had opened since we came here,” said Jackson. “Georgia has made us feel very welcome, and we’re settling in and seeing exciting things happen.”
Manufacturing can be a powerful catalyst for growth in a community -- something Georgia has known since its cotton gin days in the 18th century. Manufacturers bring new capital investments, tax revenue and -- especially welcome in this economy -- jobs. Manufacturing jobs in the Atlanta area were up by 11 percent from September 2010 to February 2011, according to CareerBuilder.
Georgia manufacturing activity jumped in February to its highest level since March 2010, according to the Econometric Center at Kennesaw State University. The center tracks new orders, production, employment, supply deliveries and finished inventory to calculate the state’s PMI (purchasing managers index), an indicator of market conditions in the manufacturing sector.
Hiring was up, with 33 percent of Georgia manufacturers reporting higher employment versus only 4 percent reporting lower employment, said Don Sabbarese, professor of economics and director of the Econometric Center at KSU’s Coles College of Business. Eighty-three percent of Georgia manufacturers expect higher production in the next three to six months, as opposed to 58 percent in January.
Chris Cummiskey, commissioner of the Georgia Department of Economic Development, isn’t surprised.
“Manufacturing is growing because of everything our state offers to prospective and existing companies,” he said. A pro-business, non-union environment; a skilled workforce and an excellent logistics system with ports, major highways, rail and the nation’s busiest airport are key attractions, he said.
Another attraction is the state’s tax code. “Most states calculate corporate income tax based on varying percentages of a company’s payroll, property and sales,” said Cummiskey. “Georgia is one of only 12 states, and the first in the Southeast, to tax only on the single factor of gross sales receipts from inside the state. That’s a significant advantage for manufacturers.”
Georgia’s decision to focus on high-quality, advanced-technology manufacturing through its Center of Innovation for Manufacturing (on Lanier Technical College’s campus) and its commitment to train a skilled labor force have also driven manufacturing growth, said Cummiskey.
“The one thing that struck Kia when they were looking for a site was a skilled and available workforce in Georgia,” said Jackson. “We talked to many mill workers in Troup County, who didn’t know what they were going to do after the mills closed. We were fortunate to be able to hire them and retrain them through our partnership with Quick Start.”
Quick Start, a division of the Technical College System of Georgia, is a provider of free, strategic workforce training solutions offered to new and expanding companies as an economic development incentive. “If all other factors are equal when companies are selecting location sites, Quick Start is often the defining reason companies come to Georgia,” said Cummiskey.
“The support of Georgia’s government and local community, the airport and the Metro Atlanta Chamber were all good reasons for us to decide to locate in Peachtree City in 2007,” said Jack Tang, president of SANY America, a subsidiary of SANY Group Ltd., the largest heavy equipment manufacturer in China. “We didn’t know much about this area until we started working with people from the chamber and economic development office here. The people were the draw.”
The company’s decision to build its first state-of-the-art assembly plant to serve its North American and global market south of Atlanta brought a $100 million investment to the state.
“We have been mostly hiring people for our sales, service and marketing departments and have successfully completed Phase 1 of building the plant [and corporate headquarters],” said Tang. “We have 110 employees now, and 72 percent of those came from the local community. We’re now preparing to hire technicians for our assembly line, which should be running by year’s end. Quick Start is preparing to help us with that.”
SANY America is already sending company representatives and models of 14 soon-to-be-made-in-Georgia products to CONEXPO-CON/AGG 2011, a leading international trade show for the construction industry, and talking engineering internship opportunities with Georgia Tech.
“Our [parent] company board is very happy and has commended us on the high quality of this project,” said Tang.
“People want to locate where other companies are growing, and we’re very proud of our existing food processing, textile, automotive, aerospace and other manufacturers,” said Cummiskey.
Last November, Gulfstream Aerospace Corp., which has been making aircraft in Savannah since 1967, announced a $500 million expansion to its facilities, which will result in an additional 1,000 Gulfstream jobs. The company already employs about 5,500 people in Savannah.
“About 60 percent of the new jobs in manufacturing come through the expansion of existing companies, who are adding good, solid-paying jobs to Georgia,” said Cummiskey. Manufacturing accounts for 9 percent of Georgia’s workforce and 10 percent of its GDP, at present.
“I think that will grow,” he said. “I think we’re going to see Georgia be a major player in manufacturing in the next five to 10 years.”
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