Gerbings

[kantuckid]

The Asians should have this stuff all in grasp: Story goes like this: When my twins went through graduation from Engr school @ UofKY in 2001 , there is a certain day when all the engr schools go through the line, each engr discipline separately. Mine were Chem & civil but the same program'list reflected that they were among the very few w/o an Asian name. Now, understand that I am not the least bit racist, but my tax money is going for 100% of the grads in some of those lines to come here from another country & train. In some ways this causes me to consider that they are more likely to "like us" or whatever culturization-sp gets you but OTOH it means we are paying to train them to where they can out produce us ?

[lkchris]

Garmin ranks way up there on value and a big + 1 on the move.

Garmin and Gerbing aren't the same thing, of course and both are cool, but Garmin for sure isn't USA made.

Gee, BMW bikes aren't either. Nor are any of the tires we fit to them.

American manufacturing will survive when American workers work at international wage rates. Only a small minority pays more for same quality as the rise of WalMart (or the bankruptcy of GM) demonstrates.

Did you see the article where ArcelorMittal is asking USA steel workers to take 36% (~$28/hr) pay cuts? http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...700997450.html

[azgman]

Riddle this. Polo shirts used to be made in Clover, SC and Florence, SC. When production moved to china, the price did NOT go down on those shirts. Where did all the money go? If you think it had nothing to do with the way taxes are figured, you need to do some research.

Well the tax holiday in China is over, and there is also a government mandate to raise wages to double what they were in 2011 by 2016. Hopefully this means some jobs coming back to the US. However there are still 1.5 billion Chinese who want stuff, so there is quite a large local market to supply.

I have about 1/3 of my global staff in China, and we started out sending jobs there to save money, but that has stopped, mostly because we could not provide the same level of service. We now keep staff there mostly to provide local support. (I am in IT)

[GlobalRider]

I don't care where it is made as long as it is a quality product.

Just because it is made in North America does not make it a quality product or the NA auto makers wouldn't have needed a bailout.

As for blaming consumers, I seem to recall my Levis jeans being made in Canada. Manufacturing then went to various other countries with far cheaper labor, but the price I paid remained the same. It sounds like upper level management were the greedy ones and are to blame.

[PIRATEJOHN]

When you get down to it the Chinese deserve a decent life too. I personally have plenty of Chinese, Mexican, and Eastern Euro friends. Some great people.

However, we all need to compete and earn a buck.

[racer7]

There are more than a few problems getting stuff done in Asia, especially China, where what we consider unethical practices are common. The most basic one though is the long logistics tail (14 weeks min on most consumer goods) and poor education of their work force. Technical training in China is abysmal and the degrees granted by most of their schools mean almost nothing in terms of real acwuired skills and knowledge. Potential buyers who are naive about that have supply and quality problems big time. The labor is cheap and diligent though so if the buyer supplies enough oversight and can handle the logisitics well, decent results can be obtained in most cases.

Gerbings had a rash of issues in China from bad quality to major backlogs of items to poor sizing control. Whether they really got them fixed there I don't know but they sure won't do any worse with US staff. There is plenty of skilled, low wage by US std textile workers still around in NC so they should have no difficulty finding them. If they treat their folks decently they won't bail. The first sign of poor plant managment in NC is when all the native locals bail and are replaced with illegals- the cause of this isn't wages but working conditions around things like mandatory odd and long hours to make up for managment failures to plan and then making that a constant work condition.(One plant I know where this happened ran 7 days, 21 hours when actually understaffed for full production at 5 days, 16 hours. That pretty much destroys families for workers) . A reason we need criminal penalities for employers hiring those without the legal right to be here.

So to my friend Jerry for when that tour happens- ask if they use the INS database systems to screen employees. Its basically a check for a valid SSID and most firms allow folks 90 days to correct any lack of that or be replaced. If Gerbings doesn't use the system, their presence in the US means little.

[JDOCKERY132445]

So to my friend Jerry for when that tour happens- ask if they use the INS database systems to screen employees. Its basically a check for a valid SSID and most firms allow folks 90 days to correct any lack of that or be replaced. If Gerbings doesn't use the system, their presence in the US means little.

I will ask; you know me. According to the press conference, it was God who directed the CEO to NC and God did it so Americans could have jobs. But you know I will ask.