Making a case for locating—or relocating—your manufacturing plant in the U.S. is easily done today. The ROI and the case studies are readily available. Of course, the number of years it takes to build your plant, and how entrenched you are in your current location, both play critical roles in that decision. But even those companies that can’t justify the cost of a full relocation are using the U.S. as ground zero for their growth strategy, building new facilities and expanding existing ones. If you’re considering starting or reshoring a production facility, these 4 points can help you prepare. Rethink. 2015 marks a manufacturing tipping point: Chinese-made products are now only 10% less expensive than those same products manufactured in the U.S., according to The Boston Consulting Group. BCG’s studies point out that Chinese wages have been escalating at about 17% per year, while the yuan has continued to rise. Those statistics, coupled with the high collateral damage caused by manufacturing U.S. products overseas, illustrates that using cheap foreign labor is no longer much of a bargain. The ROI now makes reshoring viable. Reframe. If the U.S. wants to regain its position as the number-one global manufacturing superpower, we cannot afford to rely solely on what is or isn’t happening overseas. We, in the U.S., need to revamp our own processes to both innovate and reduce costs by incorporating creativity and flexibility into our internal structures. With a little creative restructuring, companies can enjoy lower labor costs, lower overhead, and lower prices as well as higher productivity, higher wages and higher profits here. And with more and more states adopting “right to work” laws, the combination of a flexible labor pool with increased internal efficiency will enable companies to quickly regain their competitive edge in today’s global marketplace. “We […]