PROGRAMMING AREAS
Balanced Use of Natural Resources
The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development
The Pennsylvania State University
7 Armsby Building, University Park PA 16802-5602
814/863-4656(phone); 814/863-0586(fax)
Please send questions and comments to:
nercrd@psu.edu
BUSINESS RETENTION & EXPANSION VISITATION PROGRAM
CONTENTS (Part 3)
Reasons Volunteers
Participate
How the
BR&E Visitation Program Benefits Volunteers and Communities
REASONS VOLUNTEERS PARTICIPATE
Many volunteers participate because they care about the economic development of their community. Some volunteers (public officials, extension agents, development department representatives) participate because the program is essentially an extension of their current job. Some volunteers participate because they want to learn more about local industry, while others (new residents) participate because they want to learn more about their community in general. Still others (public officials, new residents, business owners and mangers) participate because they want to meet new people and develop more personal and professional relationships, while others (retirees, housewives) participate because they want to become more active in their community. And still others participate because of peer pressure. These are just some of the reasons that volunteers have been motivated to participate in previous programs.
HOW THE BR&E VISITATION PROGRAM BENEFITS VOLUNTEERS AND COMMUNITIES
Citizens and local leaders who have worked with the BR&E Visitation program cite the following reasons why they have been active participants:(5)
- BR&E Visits are fun
We guarantee you will have fun! Everybody says, "This is fun" after completing their first firm visit. You’ll enjoy socializing with other key community leaders and participating in important community decisions.
- BR&E Visitation
Program builds networks
You can build networks with other local businesses and leaders, and with regional and state economic development professionals. These contacts can often help your business or future development efforts.
- BR&E Visitation
Program is a learning experience
You will learn about your local economy’s strengths and weaknesses from the perspective of local businesses and gain insights on how your community is likely to develop in the future. You will learn about new options for working with existing firms and ways you can shape your community’s destiny.
- BR&E Visitation
Program brings the community together
In many communities, citizens and local leaders are thinking about their future, but they’re not working together to have an impact on the future. The BR&E Visitation program can bring your community together. Business persons, local government officials, education officials, professional developers and interested citizens all work together for the benefit of existing local businesses and their community.
- BR&E Visitation
Program is do-able, and it gets results
Citizens just like you and your neighbors have done this program in all sizes and types of communities. Excellent BR&E Visitation programs have been completed in rural, suburban, and urban areas and are getting results. Naturally, it’s more rewarding to work on projects that are both feasible and achieve results.
- BR&E Visitation
Program demonstrates that "we care about
business"
Just visiting firms demonstrates that your community cares about its local businesses and appreciates their economic contributions to the area. It’s surprising how many business leaders feel unappreciated and have not been personally told that the community values them.
- BR&E Visitation
Program is low risk, but only if done correctly
If you follow the guidelines in these manuals, the BR&E Visitation program is safe. As a local leader said, "How can you possibly lose?"(6)
- Improved Public Relations
with Existing Firms
Most BR&E Visitation programs send two community leaders to visit each firm; this results in improved public relations with them. Research has shown that demonstrating a pro-business attitude was rated as one of the greatest benefits of the program (7). Many firm owners have said: "This is the first time anyone has come to visit us and really listen to our opinion."
- Help Firms Solve Problems
Often firms have concerns that require immediate attention. The BR&E Visitation approach outlined in these booklets is an effective means of quickly addressing many of these concerns. For example, the Portage County, Ohio, BR&E Visitation program provided business incentive information to twenty-two of the sixty-nine firms visited in 1994. Four of these firms are planning investments of over $20 million and the addition of 117 jobs. In St. Paul, Minnesota, a firm owner mentioned during a BR&E visit that the firm might be forced to close due to a fire code problem. The BR&E Visitation program contacted the St. Paul Port Authority who worked with the firm and the fire department to develop a solution, saving 124 jobs. In reviewing the survey results, Task Force members in Harrisville, West Virginia, learned that local firms were losing business and missing shipments because the road into town was poorly marked. The Task Force worked with state government to correct the problem.
- Help Firms Become More
Competitive
Profits are essential for the retention and expansion of firms. For a firm to survive, it must make a profit—at least over the long run. If your local firms can make more profit in your community than in others, you won’t have any trouble retaining them. Since profits increase with higher prices per unit and lower costs per unit, other things being equal, BR&E programs that help firms reduce costs or increase values add to the firms’ competitiveness. For example, when the Becker Otter Tail Dairy BR&E project in Minnesota found financing was a bottleneck for expansion of many local dairy farmers, the Task Force set up a dairy financing conference, which attracted ninety local bankers. Already, over $3 million in new dairy facilities are in development. In Taylor County, West Virginia, the local BR&E Visitation Task Force found that workers lacked math skills, so they worked to establish a business and education partnership. This resulted in the development of a new program, which provides math training to workers. To give incentives to workers, a local greenhouse gave raises to workers who completed the math program. With their new math skills, workers make fewer mistakes when they mix chemicals, which saves the company money, and underscores concern for environmental issues.
- Develop Action-Based
Strategic Plans for BR&E Visitation
Few communities can tackle all of the BR&E projects that could benefit local firms. The BR&E Visitation process outlined here helps the Task Force use the data to reach a consensus on high priority projects. A recent study found that one hundred percent of the most successful BR&E Visitation programs had written action-based strategic plans (8). For example, the Anaconda, Montana, BR&E Visitation program developed an action-based strategic plan, which resulted in the following projects:
- The development of a Jack Nicklaus golf course where an ugly hazardous waste site had been located at the entrance to the community.
- The retention of a state hospital, saving five hundred jobs.
- The development of business start-up educational programs that resulted in forming eleven new businesses and expanding seventeen home-based businesses (9).
- Build Community Capacity
for BR&E
The most important long-term benefit of this action-based approach to BR&E Visitation is that it builds the capacity of the community to do BR&E. Four important aspects of this improved capacity are:
- Stronger collaboration between local development agencies, local governments, citizens, educators, and local businesses.
- A better understanding by local leaders of the strengths and weaknesses of their community’s local business climate.
- Better communication among businesses and leaders.
- Better linkages to state and federal development assistance.
A study of an Ohio BR&E Visitation program found stronger collaboration among a wide variety of local leaders—due largely to the process used by the Task Force to deal with immediate individual concerns (10) (for more information see The Local Leadership Team Manual p. 9). If you want to attract new firms, you must understand your community’s strengths and weaknesses—from the perspective of the business world. No group is in a better position to tell you what these are than your existing firms. Prospective firms considering your area as a location will send a team to visit them.
You will have more success in attracting new firms if you talk with your local firms first and understand your community’s strengths and weaknesses. For example, Fayette County, Ohio, had a long-standing reputation as having a poor labor climate as a result of strikes over twenty years earlier. However, the BR&E Visitation survey found that labor/management relations at the time of the survey were very good. The local Task Force used this information to successfully market their community to several new industrial prospects (11). Although very few economic development programs focusing on industrial attraction operate on a countywide basis, most BR&E Visitation programs do. This enables communities of varying sizes to pool their resources to help their existing firms compete.
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