Nice to See...jobs coming back from China

NY65912 · 01-31-2012, 09:36 AM

Good story of how one man is bringing back jobs into the USA. Interesting how China's labor plus shipping costs are canceling out the costs of US workers, not to mention their productivity. Now if only this catches on!

msnbc.com Video Player

widgeon13 · 01-31-2012, 10:51 AM

Great story. Makes you feel good about the grassroots of America. Hope they make it.

wdfifteen · wdfifteen's Garage

"They're not waiting for the economy to bounce back. They're making sure that it does."
I wonder how many of the bankers who snatched welfare checks from taxpayers in 2009 so they could pay themselves their bonuses would have had the courage to take such a risk. Who do you think will be the best paid over the next 5 years, the Wall street money manipulators or real entrepreneurs? Who do you think deserves it?

pegasus9 · pegasus9's Garage

He went searching for funding all throughout the east coast and the one that took a chance on him was a local banker. Damn wall street and all their greed..

Thanks for the story.

Jim Bremner · 01-31-2012, 12:41 PM

I'm trying to find a way to make bikes here! There's a gene pool that can do it. there's a market for it. I need to find away.

flatbutt · 01-31-2012, 01:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim Bremner

I'm trying to find a way to make bikes here! There's a gene pool that can do it. there's a market for it. I need to find away.

Start with a nice comfy city grocery cruiser. Boomers are aging and need a bike to do grocery grabbing with.

krystar · 01-31-2012, 02:11 PM

are u thinking motorcycles or bicycles?

85eurocarrera · 85eurocarrera's Garage

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim Bremner

I'm trying to find a way to make bikes here! There's a gene pool that can do it. there's a market for it. I need to find away.

A local guy here is trying to do just that...Bicycles that is:

f-bom (Products made for gettin' RAD!)

slow&rusty · 01-31-2012, 02:46 PM

I work in Oil and Natural Gas and in '07-'09 we used to see lots pf Vendors pedalling Chinese made steel pipe, valves and fittings now things are coming full circle and finally seeing US made products...good stuff!
Yasin

PFFOG · 01-31-2012, 02:53 PM

Yes China can make disposable stuff, but I seriously question the "savings" by manuactureres who went off shore. The engineering time, the quality control issues etc cost US companies a lot of $$, but that stuff is hard to account for, so on paper yes, purchasing saved millions, while it just flowed back off the bottom line in other costs.

911pcars · 01-31-2012, 03:42 PM

FWIW, Japan used to be the leader in manufactured goods until the resulting affluence priced them out of the manufacturing market. It went offshore (not far overseas).

Growing economies like China will go through the same pattern. However, there's always a pecking order of rising 3rd world countries ready to step up. The US has to be smart and innovative to make it better to manufacture here.

S

Groesbeck Hurricane · 02-01-2012, 03:40 AM

I've said this too many times:

Company I worked for stopped buying a specific item from a local manufacturer because on paper they could bring it in from China for about $.10 per item cheaper. Add that we moved ~120,000 per month on the slowest month so we saved, on paper, more than $200,000.00 per year or three people slots. Bonuses were given to person at top who had the idea for the scheme.

Now reality was:

The US Company went out of business. We were their main customer, family owned business with many decades of creating a quality product with almost ZERO issues per 100,000 units.

The Chinese Company could not provide the quality level of material quoted at the savings given so our real savings, after shipping, was about $.0176 per unit, on paper.

Quality was horrendous at first, about 1 unit per 100 did not work correctly and had to be culled from the line at the beginning. This was addressed and did change significantly and quickly but the first several 100k were horrible. We spent three months shipping late orders to customers.

We had to air the units out as they, literally, stank and made people sick.

Let us now remember also the little presents the Chinese Workers would send to us:

Rusty razor blades/xacto style blades TAPED into the boxes so they would cut your arm or hand if you picked up a box they were attached to.

Rusty razor blades/xacto style blades TAPED or DROPPED into boxes so you would be cut if you stuck your hand into the shipping boxes.

Plastic dragon or monkey or other animal pendants dropped into boxes. Did not cause injuries but did make line people a bit superstitious about the boxes and their contents.

Yes, it cost us more real money than was captured on paper. There were much longer lead times for deliveries so more inventory had to be held (higher cost of doing business). We had to change our way of operating and create a day wait between opening a box of material and using it (until they changed a process point on their end) so we had to buy tables adequate to hold a day's worth of production. We also had to change the way we handled material and buy mechanical equipment to avoid personal injuries.

End game, US Company was out of business, we were locked in with the Chinese Company, senior person got a huge bonus, our company actually had a higher cost of doing business, and our workers were constantly placed at risk of injury (which DID happen).

NY65912 · 02-01-2012, 04:30 AM

I have a good friend that is in the plumbing and electrical supply business. He's a real smart guy and though that making products in China (knock offs) would be a great business move, so he did.

The products were not well received. The quailty was never there. Although most contractors, including myself, are very material cost conscious we do demand a good product. A crappy product that you installed is just a problem ($$) waiting to happen.

I am so happy to see buy American clauses in our goverment contracts. It makes me feel good about what I am doing by purchasing equipment and materials made here in our country and supporting families of Americans.

Years ago we got in some pipe from China that a supplier slipped into a load. I could not figure out why I could not get a good thread on some of the 3" and 4" pipe I was working on. I checked the dies and the heads, had good oil flow. The damn pipe was out of round and I don't mean by a little!

I try to watch all the items I purchase for country of manufacture but it is almost impossible to find American made products for everything needed. But, I'll keep trying.

For transparency: Yes I do drive foriegn cars, Porsche, Audi and VW. I have owned a Fords and Chevs. All of my work vehicles (25) are either Ford or Chevs, so I am trying

Groesbeck Hurricane · 02-01-2012, 06:01 AM

Made in America does not necessarily mean made from American raw products, sub-assemblies, or even created on soil inside the 50 states.

Go through your Federal Rules and Guidelines. Scary in many instances.

There was this place that brought in a product made entirely in Russia of Russian sourced material from other locations in the world. Added 1% material from Louisiana to the product and bulk packaged it as Made in America. It then went down the supply chain to other processors. Rather deceiving, no? But, from a legal standpoint, at the time is was VERY legal.

Scott R · Scott R's Garage

This all depends on the product really. Our plastic divsion was moved to China, was a great move for us. Do you really care where your debit card is manufactured? We used to make the things in Omaha but it's just to expensive to do domestically.