EDPro

Greenville ranks 121 out of 200 largest metros in Milken's Institutes's Best Performing Cities (up from 178 out of 200 two years ago). http://bestcities.milkeninstitute.org/2007_200_Metros.pdf

I believe Michelin will be opening a retail store specifically for Michelin branded products, concentrating on their guidebooks and related travel items. (May also sell their toys, clothing, sporting goods, etc.) Very unique store and great news for downtown. If Michelin has any of these in North America, they only have 3 or 4.

I disagree. The Upstate is home to Honeywell, Champion Aerospace, and GE Transportation. GE is growing their aeropsace work in Greenville (first time Greenville received GE work outside of their energy business). They are all building engines for aerospace. In addition, Lockheed Martin and Stevens Aviation have very large Maintenance, Inspection and Repair presences at Donaldson Center. We also have GE Energy building gas turbines and Caterpillar making marine diesel engines. So, we have a skilled workforce in aerospace/engine building. Charleston is home to SKF Bearings and Piedmont Hawthorne and not too much else in aerospace manufacturing. They are bsically trying to create a workforce from scratch for Vought and Allenia. If I was locating a plant, I would certainly look to where other companies are being succcessful as a good indicator of the types of workforce and talent in an area.

Update on SC tax incentives for big-box retailers: http://www.newrules.org/retail/news_slug.php?slugid=343 From discussion on this thread back in early June.

www.southernexposuregreenville.com (Edwin McCain concert) As far as other comments in the thread, the team and ball park are obviously a great asset to the city and I have thoroughly enjoyed attending many games this year. However, the Drive organization does still have some areas that could be improved (just like most organizations). I have had several less than ideal interactions with them regarding group sales. That's the only thing negative I will say about the subject. I have brought several out-of-town friends to games and they have loved it.

If you have a minute, check out the new Chamber Channel at www.greenvillechamber.org. Several good videos on Greenville and interviews with Greenville business leaders. A few have 30 second commercials before the video, but most do not. (Being officially unveiled this evening)

journey, I received my MCRP from Clemson back in '99. (ok, I actually left early and didn't finish my thesis until a few years ago). I thoroughly enjoyed the program and the emphasis on internships and assistantships. During my two years in the program I had a public service assistantship with a small town, a medium sized county and an internship with a downtown development partnership. All led me to my career and present position (which I thoroughly enjoy). Professors were pretty strong when I was there, though they may have changed nominally since then. Drs. London and Farris helped me immensely and should be willing to talk to you about the program (along with Dr. Nocks). Also made some pretty great friends while in the program.

Very well stated Vicupstate! Incentives are basically created to spur investment by companies that draw the majority of their revenue from outside the state. Think about a manufacturer that sells product produced locally on a global or national scale; a distribution center that serves the Southeast region; a corporate headquarters for a regional, national or global company; or a research & development facility. These companies create wealth within SC by drawing most of their revenue from outside the state. In a similar way, tourism, agriculture, and mining draw "new, outside money" into an area by selling product developed locally on a national or global scale. Cabellas uses tourism as a reason to lure tax breaks, by saying that it is a destination shopping experience. In my humble opinion, the proliferation of these stores (one in Georgia, one coming to NC) means that the vast majority of its sales will be made to locals or to tourists who would have already been in the area (thus might have spent their "outside dollars" with a locally owned retailer).

If they are they may take advantage of SC's new tax incentives for national retailers: http://www.charleston.net/stories/?newsID=...ection=business (FWIW, I think this is exceedingly bad public policy)

There are some existing connections between Panoz Racing (American Le Mans) and Clemson as well as some NASCAR connections, though many of those were cultivated by the late Don Rice. Formula One is definitely the target. The average R&D budget for a Formula One car is roughly ten times the size of the R&D budget for a NASCAR team (think $250M/year vs. $25M/year)...which sort of makes sense considering they are called "stock" cars.

Quick comment on the wind tunnel: When the leaders of the Wind Tunnel Task Force approached BMW 4 years ago about building a wind tunnel in Greenville, BMW was unimpressed. After a few attempts to convince BMW of the need for a wind tunnel, BMW countered with their need for talented automotive engineers (not specialized equipment) hence the Campbell Graduate Automotive Engineering School. With Timken, Society of Automotive Engineers, Sun Microsystems, Microsoft, Michelin, and IBM as corporate partners, CU-ICAR is light years ahead of most university research parks at this stage of maturity. As mentioned above, a wind tunnel would be great, but I believe the idea is to now actually widen the scope of CU-ICAR from automotive to transportation systems, as opposed to narrowing from automotive to motorsports.

RT, just a website glitch. That is/was a logo from their sister station in Pittsburgh.

An interesting case occured in Austin (the de facto home of the independent business movement). The city had incentivized a developer to redevelop a block downtown. Kudos all around. But this particular block that was being redeveloped was next to Book People and Waterloo Records, two distinctly Austin businesses (Book People is the largest independent bookstore in Texas). And word leaked out that Borders was an anchor company for the new development. No one had a problem with the incentives to the developer, but they did have a problem with the city incentivizing national retailers at the expense of local retailers. Thus was born www.ibuyaustin.com and the ensuing Keep Austin Weird campaign. In this case the city and the developer reconsidered and the corporate headquarters of another Austin company ended up locating in the newly redeveloped block (Whole Foods HQ). So, Greenville needs to tread lightly when building parking decks and funding streetscape improvements for developments that cater to national retailers. It is certainly a blurry line, but any assistance (financially or infrastructure) should heavily favor local businesse and retailors over national chains).

Respectfully disagree... 3 types of people in the world. Those who can count and those who can't. (sorry for the digression folks, I'm just not able to pass up a chance to use that joke)

Just a quickie: Was at the begining of today's 'businessman's special' at the ballpark. After about an inning and a half, the rain came. The first thing played on the jumbotron during the rain delay was "The More Cowbell Sketch" from Saturday Night Live. Very funny and pretty hip of the management.

I'm pretty sure this has been posted on this thread sometime before, but thought there may be some of us that hadn't seen it: www.greenvilledailyphoto.com

Is that the Dr. Charles Townes statue?

Anyone seen this yet: www.tonytrout.com While I certainly appreciate what he and 7(?) other County Council members did to pass the MLK Day resolution, I'm starting to hear stories that he is a bit of a loose cannon. His blog is definitely pretty entertaining. (disclaimer: I do not live in his district)

Last quote in article may be the most relevant. While this may help in "recruiting" business to the area, how sustainable is marketing yourself as low-cost as an economic development strategy? Mexico has roughly 1/5th the cost structure and China is around 1/15th.

I'll have to put a plug in for the Jamiacan place on Main Street. The atmosphere isn't great (cheap tables, chairs, etc), but the food is great. I recommend the jerk pork, jerk chicken or curry chicken. Located next to Sophisticated Palate on Main, near McBee. Edit: SleepyPossum correctly identified this place as Island Blend about 10 post ago. Oops.

www.clemson.edu/autoresearch

That's really a shame. It would be nice if this state would think less regionally and more as a whole. I hope Columbia's efforts with Innovista and other areas go well. Columbia's gain is not Greenville's loss or vice versa.

From a really brief discussion with a city official: 1. The West End has always had a village atmosphere and the City wants to maintain the corresponding human scale. 2. The is some disagreements on the methodology of the Clemson scientist noted in the above article. Apparently the bricks he/she tested were the most vunerable bricks in the building (what I mean is: he/she most likely chose bricks directly below a leaky window sill or otherwise exposed to an inordinate amount of water saturation). Just what I heard... And as for my opinion, I echo VicUpstate's thoughts. Who's to say that in 30-50 years, City Hall won't be viewed as an excellent example of formalism style architecture. I know almost nothing about architecture, but it seems many of the buildings in the past that were viewed as unappealing often come back into style. Just for example, there is a house on the corner of McDaniel Ave and Cothran that is in the international style. I used to really dislike it. But it has really grown on me recently, as has the international style (I commute past it every day).

I'm not a technologist myself, but I would recommend attending some www.gsatc.org events and benchmark some best practices of similar local companies.

Oh, hey BREED. Camperdown Bridge Bombers here. Hope the Five Forks Flying Elvi's off-season is going well.